


Shirtsleeves

by LouisianaSkiess (TenWoolf)



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-02
Updated: 2016-07-20
Packaged: 2018-05-17 19:06:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 30
Words: 59,034
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5882128
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TenWoolf/pseuds/LouisianaSkiess
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ellison Taylor grew up on mythology thanks to her mom. When she moves to Beacon Hills to live with her Aunt she finds herself in the middle of the action and mystery that surrounds Scott and Stiles.<br/>Largely follows canon, around end of S1 (Search For The Cure), and through S2.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Testing...one...two...three
> 
> A new girl arrives in Beacon Hills and Stiles is like "woah star wars", Scott is suspicious.

“Alright, class, we have a new student.” The teacher announced. “I don’t think we’ve ever had this many students transfer in one year before. Class, this is Ellison Taylor, Ellison why don’t you tell us a bit about yourself.”

I tugged on the bottom of my purple pineapple printed shorts nervously. Trying to ignore the feeling that an elephant was sitting on my chest. “Uh. Okay. I’m borderline INFJ/INFP, I've only watched one Star Wars movie,” at the back of the room a boy with a buzzcut jolted and nearly fell out of his seat. “I like internet and books…. Uh. And I moved here from Louisiana, land of voodoo, vampires, and werewolves.”

“Werewolves?” the English teacher look skeptical.

“Yeah, Rougarou. It’s Cajun mythology.” Whatever enthusiasm that I had during that little interlude faded quickly as I explained it. I found my finger absentmindedly looped under the hair tie around my wrist twirling it around.

The teacher didn’t look too amused. “You can take the seat behind Mr. Stilinski. Stiles?”

Buzzcut boy raised his hand. The teacher handed me a packet of papers and gestured for me to take a seat.

As I made my way to the back of the room, I could feel all eyes on me. Great I’d already managed to brand myself as a freak.

“Hey.” Buzzcut turned in his seat slightly. “I’m Stiles.” I nodded, preoccupied with the eyes that had all turned to watch me. “Don’t mind them…. So werewolves?”

“Um. Yeah it’s stupid. Whatever.” I frowned. This kid was going to make fun of me too. Stiles jerked back when the boy with floppy hair smacked his shoulder.

“Ow, dude I don’t think you know how hard you hit.”

I lowered my eyes but I didn’t miss him jerk his head in my direction and then shake his head at Stiles.

I kept my head down for the rest of class, trying not to draw any attention to myself. Stiles kept trying to get my attention though, and was reprimanded my the teacher a few times for it. It didn’t help that in the hallway between classes, I heard some red head telling her friend that she was glad that she wasn’t the one being stared at today. By lunch I was over the whole day, I just wanted to go for a run on the treadmill at home or maybe run around the neighborhood and blow off some steam. In the lunch room, I scanned the tables till I spotted an empty one. Far away from both the red head and Stiles. I quickly made a beeline for it, taking out my lunch box and a notebook to busy myself.

“Um. Excuse me?” I looked up from the notebook to a rather intimidating looking guy sitting a few seats over across from me. “Why are you sitting here?”

“Is this your table? I’m sorry. I can leave?”

“No. um. It’s fine, it’s just no one usually sits here but me.”

“Sorry I didn’t know.”

“You’re new?”

“Yeah. I’m Ellison.”

“Boyd.” He smiled and a sort of teddy bear like warmth spread across his face.

“So is it okay that I sit here?”

Boyd thought for a second and nodded. “Yeah its okay. You’re no where near as annoying as Stilinski. He thinks we’re friends.” Boyd grimaced.

“Sounds like such a hardship.” I smirked.

“More like a pain in the ass.” A small smile crossed Boyd’s face.

Boyd and I spent the rest of the lunch in a mutual silence, me-writing and Boyd-eating.


	2. Chapter 2

Free period wasn’t something I was familiar with, and to realize I have one right after Lunch meant that I probably could have avoided the lunch room scene today and for the rest of the semester if it wasn’t for Aunt Liz’s weird schedule of conferences and classes. Or the fact that she’d probably freak out more than she should if she saw me home and not ‘adjusting’ to school and making friends. So instead of booking it out of there and seeing if I could make it home for a few minutes, I parked it outside at a picnic table to enjoy the coolness of the air, a startling difference from the almost always humid weather back home. But of course, instead I found myself enjoying the cool air, on my laptop and totally plugged out of the atmosphere of Beacon Hill High School with headphones, music, and the decision to email my mother.

A shadow fell over the table, the two shadows were talking to each other, so I paused the music to listen and wait for the obvious attempt to get my attention.

“Come on Scott, she said werewolves, maybe she can help. You don’t think she hates me? Or like is a mega bitch?”

“Dude seriously I think you scared her earlier, besides she’s new, and anxious. I can smell it.”

“Well she is INFJ/INFP.”

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“Myers-Briggs personality types, it means she’s an introvert. Don’t you pay attention in class?”

“Why didn’t she just say that then?”

“Really, buddy?”

“Fine, I’m going find Allison.”

“Yeah you do that.”

I definitely recognized those voices, Scott and Stiles, but seriously what the fuck, smell anxiety?? Why did I feel like I’ve heard of that before?

“Hey.” Stiles sat down across from me and tapped his hand near my computer.

“Yes?” I pulled off the headphones and looked over at him. Stiles was bouncing with nervous energy.

“I hope I didn’t offend you in class, or anything. I think werewolves are cool, also Star Wars.” Stiles nodded rapidly. “May the fourth be with you, right? Star Wars day?”

When I didn’t say anything he continued on, “I know being new can’t be easy, and I also know that Mr. Burns is actually not as bad as Harris believe it or not but he’s quite the satanic teacher. Whatever you do just don’t write a paper about the history of circumcision.”

“Um. What?” I sucked in my lower lip to hide my amusement.

Stiles sputtered. “Yeah sorry. I probably should have kept that to myself. But for the record I didn’t write that paper for English I wrote it for Economics.”

“Well that’s new.” I bit my lip. “I mean, I don’t see you getting an A on that, but I’m sure your teacher wasn’t expecting it, B+ for interesting topic and shock value.”

Stiles nodded. “Coach wasn’t too happy though, made me run suicides in practice for it.”

“Practice? Football? You don’t look like the football type.” I tilted my head to the side, studying his build.

“Uh. No. Sport here is Lacrosse.”

“I’ve never actually seen lacrosse being played in a public school.”

“You should come to a game.” Stiles looked mildly surprised at himself.

“What’s your position?” I typed a note to myself to look up lacrosse.

“Oh, I, uh. I sit the bench. Scott. Scott made first line this year though.”

“I’ll think about it. It sounds fun. Who knows, maybe I’ll be lucky and you’ll even play.”

There was a beat of silence where Stiles fidgeted ever more than he had been.

“Okay, seriously what is it?” I sighed and closed my laptop.

“How much do you know about werewolves?”

“Depends. Which mythology are you going off of, Norse, Greek, European, Native American?” I blurted before I could stop myself.

Stiles breathed out a relieved sigh. “So you know a lot?”

“I know a lot about the basic myth, and the French one. My mom teaches mythology at UNO. What do you want to know about it?” I might as well indulge the kid, something about him made me just want to blurt it all out.

“Do you think your mom could answer a question about like what happens if you don’t turn into a werewolf from a bite?”

“No.” I bit the inside of my cheek.

“Oh.” Stiles’ face fell.

“I mean she probably could, but I don’t think my Aunt would like me racking up a long distance bill.” Or the fact that I’d be calling my mom.

“Oh. Your -. Your mom doesn’t. Oh.”

I was kind of enjoying the fact that he looked like he was suddenly really sorry for even asking.

“I can try though.” Stiles perked up a bit. “I have a lot of my moms books at home. mostly e-books so I can search quicker.” Stiles nodded. “and for the record, my mom is going though some stuff, I had to come live with my aunt. So you didn’t step into too soft of a subject unwillingly.”

“I’d ask what happened, or if you wanted to talk about it, but I think you don’t want to talk about it to a stranger so.”

“That’s kinda exactly what I said to Aunt Liz when she tried to send me see the school physiologist.”

“The guidance counselor?”

“Same thing.” I shrugged. “So what are you looking for exactly? Just bite stuff?”

“Do you know anything about a Cure? I was watching these videos by this guy named Conrad Haberlind, but he goes by Conrad Fernis-“

“Like Loki’s son?”

Stiles beamed. “YES!”

“I could have said like Fenrir Greyback.”

“I’d have accepted it.” Stiles smirked.

“Wait, I think my mom knew that guy. Not Greyback, obviously, he one named like Loki’s son.” I squinted a little at Stiles.

“She knows him?”

“Well of him. Mythology wise he’s held in high regard. Medically? Not so much. You know he lives in Beacon Hills right? Well near here anyway. He works at that hospital.”

“Wait he does?!”

“Yeah.”

“So like you could show me where he lives at if I asked?”

“Lives? No. Works? Probably. Besides I’m sure you can google it. And it’s a little creepy to just show up at someone’s home when you’ve never met the person.”

“Good.” Stiles was silent for a beat. “So you said you liked nerdy stuff, does that include comics?”

“I like Batman movies.” I offered, shrugging.

“I can work with Batman.” Stiles grinned.

~-~

Walking away from free period (and by the end of school that day), I guess I’d acquired a friend in Stiles.

I groaned, trying to find my keys in my backpack, even though my car had keyless entry, with hands full of papers and books, was a hard task.

“Woah.” A hand shot out, grabbing the stack of books before they tumbled out of my arms.

“Thanks. Oh hey Scott, right?”

“Yeah.” Scott leaned nervously against my car, glancing over his shoulder. “Stiles said you know a lot about mythology.”

“Yeah I dabble.” I glanced up at Scott then back down at the pouch. “VICTORY!” I squeaked quietly, doing a little dance. Scott laughed. I pushed the button and opened the backseat to toss my bag in there, pulling out my phone and ipod before turning to Scott to take my books from him.

“Thanks. Again.” I waved the books at him.

“Do –do…umm, do you believe in them?” Scott shifted his weight nervously.

“In….? You mean werewolves?”

“Uh. Yeah.” Scott scratched the back of his head.

“I mean yeah, sort of, I’ve not no proof, but like dragons, there’s too much on the subject and across all cultures for it to of have some sort of truth.” I closed the backseat door and leaned against it. “To me, it’s kind of like how voodoo and vampires aren’t real to some people but if you’ve ever made a trip down a shadier street in New Orleans you’d know that voodoo is very real and should not be messed with. One of my friends actually had a great aunt who dabbled. We stayed away from her.”

“And vampires?”

“I’ve never come across one.” I joked, “I know there’s the medical condition, and the more literal ones, like mosquitoes, leeches, and some bats. But, haven’t you heard of the story of that Princess, or Queen, I always forget which, she used to bathe in the blood of her virgin handmaidens because she believed it made her younger. She was accused of being a vampire. And people think Bram Stoker had a real life influence for Dracula. Maybe at some point they were real and died out, maybe they still are and they just got better at hiding it." ... "Countess Elizabeth Báthory! That's it. I hope you don’t think that was too creepy. I’m trying to dial it back.” I sighed, backtracking a bit.

“No. No. That –that was actually exactly what I was hoping to hear.” Scott looked just as nervous as I felt and I swear Scott’s eyes flashed a strange amber color for a split second.

“I hope you’re not planning on spreading that over school. Branding me as a freak?”

Scott’s face fell. “No! No. Definitely not.” A scared and pained look crossed his features.

“Hey! Scotty! Ellison? Car trouble? I have cables in my jeep if you need a jump.” Stiles literally swooped in saving Scott and I from any more awkward interaction by patting Scott on the back.

“No my car is fine. If the battery was dying you’d be hearing my car alarm right now. It never fails.” Laughing I tapped the roof of my car, I found myself nodding like an idiot. “Erm, yeah so I better get going. Good luck with, whatever, Scott. I hope that helped, or something.”  
Stiles flashed a look of confusion at Scott. He made a reassuring gesture at Stiles and turned back to me.

“Drive safe, Ellison.”

I nodded and slipped into the drivers seat. Scott pushed the door closed for me.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Very sorry, none of this is edited; so I apologize for any strange sentence structures or story threads that come out of no where.  
> I've always loved Search For The Cure and it's hardly used in fic, so yes we'll be going through it.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Where Ellison is pulled into the fold and Scott and Stiles search for a cure by stalking Dr. Fenris.

*few days later*

        “ELL!” Aunt Liz yelled from downstairs.

          “Yeah??”

       “I hope you’re presentable, kiddo, a couple of people are stopping buy tonight.” Liz yelled back, realizing that I wasn’t going to move.

        “Kay!” I wasn’t going to move.  Hopefully whoever it was wouldn’t be too offended by the oversized distressed Beacon Hills tank top and the yoga pants I was wearing.  Ignoring Aunt Liz’s request I cuddled into the deep purple body pillow instead, half watching the latest marathon of Law & Order: SVU.  I was exhausted from nearly a week of dealing with Lydia and Allison, now that Lydia had determined that I was worth sinking her nails into and getting to know, she sat near me in almost every class we had together to talk clothes, and Allison who was really sweet and saved me from Lydia’s nail talk several times when she caught me biting mine.  I only half lifted my head off the mountain of pillows when the doorbell rang and the hurried click of Aunt Liz’s heels against the hard wood floors.  Why the woman insisted on wearing heels while she was at home was a mystery. I tuned out my aunt’s greetings for the sass of Olivia Benson.

        “Uh Hey?”

        I jumped. “Stiles? What are you doing here?”

       “Apparently my dad knows your Aunt or something. Scott’s mom is on her way too?” Stiles sounded unsure. “Your aunt sent me up here.”

       “Oh. Um. You can sit if you want.” I sat up and gestured vaguely.

       “Uh. Y-yeah. I’ll –uh –do that.” Stiles face went a little pink and he looked away from me to the deep blue desk chair. Then I remembered what I was wearing. Of course Stiles would become a stammering mess all because he caught a side view of my bra.

         “So Scott’s coming too?”

         “I think so.” Stiles nodded vigorously and glanced at the TV. “Law & Order. Good show. I prefer to live it but…”

          “Not all of us can live with a sheriff and a police radio in our cars.” I snorted, remembering what he told me. “Besides this is so much more than, like, arresting people, and none of them ever really dress like cops.”

        “Except that one episode.”

       “RIGHT! They’ve hardly ever been stereotypical city cops. But the stories all end realistically, some cases are won, some are lost, and some are never solved.”

         Stiles nodded again, almost spastically while he glanced around my room.

        “Oh wow, you have a lot of books.”  Stiles’ eyes were glued to the floor to ceiling book shelf near my bed.

           “Uh. Yeah. I read a lot.” I nodded, then I remembered what he had mentioned a few days before. “Oh, uh, did you still want to look for that thing you asked about at lunch, I can look real quick.”

          Stiles froze for a second, “Yeah, actually, yeah that would be cool.”

         “Okay.” I flipped myself off the bed and reached over him to grab my tablet and plopped back down on the edge of the bed. “Cures and bites, right?”

          “Uh. Yeah.”

I searched through a few books that my mom loved to teach from before everything happened. “Sorry, Stiles, nothing.”

His phone buzzed in his pocket.

“Looks like Scott’s not going to make it. He has work tonight…and so does his mom.” Stiles looked up at me slowly. “Wait, you said you knew where that guy worked right? You think he’d know something?”

“I don’t know. Maybe?”

“Wanna find out? We can get Scott to meet us after he gets off work and ask him.”

“Yeah I guess, I’ll just tell Liz that you’re showing me around or something?”

“Perfect.”

Stiles grinned and started tapping away furiously on his phone.

“ELL! STILES? FOOD!”

“Oh than goodness I’m starved.” I tossed my ipad into the sheets and grabbed a hoodie, Aunt Liz would have a whole herd of cattle if I walked downstairs like this, especially since I’ve been in my room with Stiles and the Sheriff was downstairs. “Le’go!”

Aunt Liz side-eyed my attire when I sat at the table in my usual seat, Stiles immediately taking the empty one next to me to avoid sitting next to my Aunt, or possibly to avoid sitting next to his dad who would probably jab at him to get him to say things.

To put it shortly, the dinner as quiet. Aunt Liz talked, Mr. Stilinski talked, Stiles and she did not. Until they started desert, anyway.

Stiles cleared his throat, “Uh, Dad, Ms. Taylor, I was wondering if it would be okay to take Ellison and show her around town after we finish here.”

I was impressed. Stiles managed to sound a little bit normal and not stutter, despite the fact that I could practically feel his leg bouncing with nerves.

“Sounds fine with me.” Aunt Liz spoke up. Color me surprised.

The Sheriff was a bit more reluctant. He stared hard at Stiles for a minute making Stiles shift awkwardly in his seat.

“Fine.” He relented. Stiles not-so-subtlety sighed in relief. “Try not to get in any trouble.”

Yeah Stiles wasn’t getting off as easy as he had hoped.

To my surprise Aunt Liz spoke up again and started to ramble, “Oh I’m sure they won’t. Ell can certainly hold her own. She’s lived in that rough city of New Orleans most of her life. My brother had her in all kinds of self defense classes, this kid can side aerial over an aslant while spraying mace.”

“Uh. Aunt Liz. I’ve never done that.” My face burned a little at the over praise, I don’t want the Sheriff to start thinking I’m some sort of vigilante superwoman.

“Nonsense of course not, but you could.”

I just rolled my eyes.

“I’m going grab some shoes.” I muttered, excusing myself from the table.

Aunt Liz called after me, “Don’t forget your phone!”

“Like I ever would,” I muttered under my breath in a sing-song fashion. 

Stiles laughed, making me jump and almost fall backward down the stairs.

“Sorry.”

“I thought you were still at the table.”

“I, uh, I didn’t want to sit there an be lectured so.” Stiles followed me into my room.

I nodded at him absently, searching for my bag and phone, while trying to slip my feet into a pair of old beat up plaid vans. I quickly checked the contents of my purse, phone –check, wallet –check, keys –attached to wallet so check.

“Okay we’re good to go.”

“Great.” Stiles stuck both his thumbs up, then looked at them as if they had betrayed his father. “Uh, right so we go down stairs say bye, get in my jeep, you tell me where we need to go, I text Scott, we go wait for Scott and then yeah. Uh.”

Right okay.” I cut in, trying to save some of Stiles’ integrity.

I started lightly down the stairs with Stiles at my heels.

“Stiles hasn’t always been good with the girls. He’s been hanging on to one since he was about 8, but that’s when Claudia died, I’d hoped he’d move past it. Maybe it was a phase.”

“Like I’ve said, Ellison is a very strong girl, she doesn’t hold back, almost as if she doesn’t have a filter. She’ll keep him on his toes and let him know if he offends her.” Her aunt laughed, “Who knows maybe he’ll get the girl yet.”

I glanced at Stiles over my shoulder to see him completely red in the face. So I stomped down the rest of the stairs so that the Sheriff and Aunt Liz’s conversation halted, I wasn’t too comfortable knowing they’d be talking about us but I was even more concerned about getting Stiles out of there before he crawled under the floorboards and never left. Then he’d really never get the poor girl to notice him.

“Uh, okay we’re leaving, I’ll be back whenever! I have my keys so don’t wait up!” I quickly pushed Stiles toward the door, waving over my shoulder.

“Bye?” Stiles managed to wave over his shoulder in response to his dad’s confusion.

Once we’d both made it outside the door, Stiles’ shoulders sagged.

“Uh, I –I’m sorry.”

“Stiles, I have literally zero clue why you’re apologizing. So let’s get out of here.”

Stiles lightened considerably, nodding. He reached into the backseat and tugged a baseball cap onto his head.

So um. Planning on playing any baseball tonight?” I was trying so hard not to laugh.

“Oh laugh it up. I thought it was something different, unrecognizable.” Stiles grumbled

“Sorry I laughed."

Stiles nodded. I dug out my ipod and quickly recited the name of the hospital for Stiles.

“Yeah, good. That matches the one I found online.” Stiles quickly tapped out a text to Scott, while I searched for a good song to play.

“If you already knew then why bring me?”

Stiles shrugged, “I thought you might be one for a little adventure. Besides you’re smart, your mom is familiar with him, and I needed to make sure.”

“Mhmm”

“Yup.” Stiles popped his lips.

“So this little adventure to see this werewolf expert wouldn’t have anything to do with the fact that Scott’s a werewolf?” I had worked it out after a series of conversations that were badly whispered during classes, not to mention a few of Scott's...slip ups.

The car jerked. “W –wha –what do you mea? Scott’s… Scott’s not…”

“Yeah, look you’re talking to someone who’s grown up on myths. Choose your words wisely.”

“He’s not a werewolf?” Stiles tried.

“Yeah not buying it.” I shook my head.

“Uh. Okay. So… what makes you think that he is what you think he is?”

“You mean aside from all the very obvious questions about werewolves? Or that Scott’s eyes flash amber? Or hey how about that tidbit where I heard Scott saying he could smell anxiety? OR that Scott asked me if I thought werewolves were real? I’m not dumb Stiles. Like, I’m really NOT dumb.”

“I.. okay so what if he was?” Stiles shifted.

“He’s still Scott,” I shrugged, “Obviously you need some help. Plus it’s not like I’m one to talk. I’m new, I’m already weird, and why would I betray a secret like that?”

“Understandable.” Stiles’ head bobbed. "You're... uh... you're being really rational about this..."

“Yeah well.” I shrugged, watching the trees as we drove past. “I won’t tell Scott you admitted. If you want we can play how-long-till-he-tells-me-himself.”

Stiles pursed his lips. “I like that idea. You’re evil, but I like it.”

“And now we wait.” Stiles nodded, pulling into a parking spot with a clear view of the entrance and letting his jeep stall. We talked about things we liked, music, movies and such, eventually rolling down the windows and turning off the car.

“Yeah, bu-t” Stiles was cut off with a loud thunk. Scott’s head appeared right over mine.

“Alrig –hey?” he looked at me a little confused.

“Not that the confused puppy look isn’t working for you, but it isn’t working for me, Scott.”

Stiles bit his lip. “Yeah so I found something.”

Stiles bit his lip. “Yeah so I found something.”

“I see that?” Scott eyed me, hopping down.

“No I mean I found something that might have answers.”

“Yeah, Ellison.”

“No. Not Ellison. Well yes, Ellison but this isn’t about her.”

The pair walked around to the front of the jeep.

“Not that I’m not flattered or anything, but even I don’t have all the answers.” I muttered.

“Right.” Stiles nodded at me, “Elli might be a wealth of werewolf mythological knowledge, but I found an expert, Conrad Haberlind.”

“Slightly offended.” I commented. “And a nickname already?”

“Oh hush, you made fun of the hat.” Stiles rolled his eyes.

“Yeah okay what?” Scott butted in. I leaned up against the side of the hood, Stiles pulled up a video for Scott and started his explanation. I tuned them out, playing a rousing game of solitaire on my phone instead.

The two boys to my left suddenly went quiet.

“There he is.” Oh.

They whispered a bit more before Stiles turned to me.

“Go! I’m not getting in trouble for stalking someone. I’ll wait in the car.” I waved them off.

Stiles nodded and headed off.

“STILES!” I hissed. “Keys please?”

Stiles halted and turned on his heel tossing me the keys. “Please be careful.” It was a nice sentiment, but I couldn’t tell if he meant for me to be careful or to be careful with his jeep. Actually, maybe he was talking _to_ the jeep.

I nodded, slotting a key between each finger before slipping into the passenger seat and returning to my game of solitaire to distract myself. I really didn’t want to have to witness the mess that those two were about to get into.

Stiles popped into the front seat, for once I was unfazed by his sudden appearance, but I groaned when I realized Scott was waiting for me to move so he could get in the passenger seat.

“C’mon you’re tiny. You’ll be fine back there.” Scott bounced.

“I swear if I touch a dirty sock or a jock strap, I’m murdering.”

“You’ll be fine. I cleaned it out last week.” Stiles tried to muster up a reassuring smile. I groaned and slid backwards into the backseat, nearly landing on several lacrosse sticks and a gym bag.

“Gross.”

“It’s not that bad!”

“Go, Go, GO!”

“Alright, alright.” Stiles put the jeep in drive and sped out of the parking lot.

“Okay, so where are we going?” I leaned forward between the two idiots.

“Uh. His house?”

“What?”

“Yeah he thought we were mugging him and bolted. Plus he has a lot of books so..” Stiles trailed off.

“We’re not stealing anything are we?” Scott frowned.

“Of course not, I figured we could take what we needed on my phone.”

“That might be the only smart thing you’ve said yet.” I muttered.

“Elli.” Stiles sighed. My stomach twisted.

Stiles stopped the car. “There it is, now we wait.”

“We’re doing a lot of waiting.” I said sarcastically.

Scott sent Stiles a glance. I’m sure he was annoyed with me already.

“She’s joking. She’s joking. Right Elli, you are joking, right?” Stiles looked back at me, I grinned and waved my fingers.

“Maybe.”

He rolled his eyes.

“Oh look he’s leaving, let’s go.”

I climbed out of the back, jogging to keep up with Scott and Stiles’ long strides.

“You realize this is insane right?” I whispered to the two.

“She’s right, Stiles, this is a bad idea.”

“You say that about all my ideas.”

“Because they are all bad!” Scott whisper-yelled. I bit my tongue.

Stiles rolled his eyes. “You learn more from failures than successes.”

Scott snorted, “Well, you must be a genius by now.”

The two bantered back and forth till the reached the front porch. Stiles shrugged off his plaid shirt. I blinked at the sight of his biceps. Why would you keep those covered up? Damn.

“Stiles what are you doing?” Scott sighed.

Stiles wrapped this shirt around his fist. “It’s just glass.”

“Uh. Guys?”

Stiles slammed his fist into the window before I could finish.

“I don’t think that’s glass.” I crossed my arms.

“Thanks a lot, Elli, real class A Sherlock you are.”

“Let me see.” I sighed, taking his hand in mine, “can you move it?”

Stiles curled his fingers slowly, grimacing.

“You’re fine, but you should probably ice that, you’ll have a bruise.”

“And what did we learn from that failure?”

“Oh, that’s funny, Wolf’s got jokes tonight!” Scott froze a little but relaxed when he realized I was still inspecting Stiles’ hand. I released Stiles’ hand awkwardly.

Behind me Scott said something about a key and went to unlock the door.

“Yeah okay this is where I bow out, I’m not breaking and entering. Keys?”

Stiles shoved his good hand into his pocket and handed them to me.

“Thank you. Don’t get shot.” I sang,  and patted Stiles’ shoulder. “Try not to punch anymore bullet proof glass, kay?”

“Yeah I’ll try, thanks.” Stiles muttered sarcastically.

I trotted back to the car, none too fond of being alone in the dark, but I had Stiles’ keys between my knuckles as makeshift brass knuckles again and some pepper spay in my purse on my own set of keys. I wound up sitting behind the wheel just in case, not that I’d be able to drive the Jeep in case of an emergency, it was a stick shift and I had absolutely no idea how to drive anything other than standard.

After one long, agonizing minute I started to worry, bouncing my leg in an almost Stiles like fashion. I’d know this kid for maybe a week tops and I was already picking up his mannerisms or maybe he was exaggerating my own nervous actions, ugh. I found myself tapping on the steering wheel and nervously glancing at the house, then down the road in both directions. I don’t think I even have Stiles or Scott’s numbers to warn them if someone appears.  I had to distract myself before I gave myself an anxiety attack… solitaire it is.

I glanced up, finishing the 4th game, to see Stiles practically bolting for the jeep. _Shit_. He slowed when he got closer though, so I pushed open the door.

“How’d it go?”

“He’s scary, I almost got shot.”

“Wait. What?” Stiles motioned for me to move so he could get in, once I was in the backseat he turned to face me.

“Yeah Fenris, he was home. He hadn’t left. He must have known we followed him. Anyway, after he tried to shoot me, we managed to convince him to give us, like, 5 minutes.”

“You were in there way longer than 5.”

“Yes I know.” Stiles opened his mouth again, but shut it when Scott hauled himself into the car.

“Let’s go,” Scott sighed.

“What did you say to him?”

“I just told him where he could find his cigarettes.”

“Okay, I’m dropping you off at home and taking Elli around town like I promised.”

Scott nodded and flashed a grin back at me.

“If he gets handsy, tickle him under the chin.”

“Uh, how about I just punch him? He’s not bullet proof glass.”

Scott laughed.

“Cut it out, buddy.” Stiles pushed Scott slightly.

When we pulled up in front of Scott’s house, all the lights were off.

“See you two at school.” Scott gave Stiles a rather pointed look.

“Yeah, yeah. I’ll call you.” Stiles waved Scott off.

Once the boy was out of the car and starting up the lawn, I moved into the front seat. Stiles didn’t wait for Scott to get inside, instead he pulled away from the curb as soon as I had my seat belt on.

“So, something has occurred to me while I was waiting in your jeep.”

“Oh yeah, what’s that?”

“I had absolutely no way of contacting either of you if someone came up the street, or tried to kidnap me.”

Stiles pursed his lips and pulled off the road and held out his hand.

“Let’s solve that right now. Because I actually don’t like the idea of you not having my number since you know.” I handed Stiles my phone, and he rambled on, “I mean what if something happens, you can’t always call your aunt, and I don’t think you have my dad’s number, or anyone who’d really be able to help you, at least not out here. I’m totally reachable, always.” Then he caught himself. “I’ll, uh, add Scott’s number too.”

“So what places do I absolutely need to know about here in the glorious Beacon Hills?” I asked when Stiles handed me back my phone.

“Well I’m glad you asked, because I’m going to show you.” Stiles grinned.

Nearly every place we passed, Stiles had a story about how him and Scott had got into some sort of trouble. We passed the Bowling Alley, Scott’s horrendous bowling skills were brought up, the mall that he and Scott got kicked out of nearly every summer since they were 13 for various reasons, one of which involved a poorly timed lacrosse equipment test. Then there were places that had no stories that Stiles could remember, like the ice rink, because he’d only been there once when he was really little. He pointed out the video rental store, the preserve(and the subsequent story about how Scott was bitten), and a couple of fast food restaurants Stiles frequented. The hospital, where Melissa McCall worked, the police station,

“If you ever need to talk to my dad just tell them that, if they give you trouble, call me.”

It was nice to learn so much about a town that I had just dropped into.

“Must have been nice growing up.”

“Hmm?”

“Scott’s mom is a nurse, your dad is a cop. The two of you kind of have things good, you get hurt Scott’s mom helps, you get in trouble, your dad helps.”

“When you put it that way, yeah I probably got away with more than the average kid, and better medical care.” Stiles laughed. “I also probably behave worse than any police kid should.”

“Eh, you’re not that bad.” I shrugged. Stiles snorted.

“You’ll learn.”

“I hope you’re not actually trying to push me away.” I joked.

“Oh! No! No, definitely not.” Stiles looked a little alarmed.

“Good.” I leaned back into the seat, curling my body so I was facing Stiles, the toes of my shoes just touching his leg. “What time is it?”

Stiles did a double take at the dash, “11:45, I guess I should be getting you home.”

“Yeah. Okay.” I nodded, closing my eyes. “You should totally text me and we can hang out one day.”

“Mhmm.” Stiles hummed tersely.

“You okay?”

“Yeah I’m fine.” Stiles pulled up at my house. It’s still weird calling this home. “I’ll see you at school, yeah?”

“Fo’Sho!” I leaned over to hug Stiles good-bye, he stiffened a little before hugging back loosely. “Good night, Stilinski!”

“Night, Taylor.”


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Where Ellison has a temper and it shows, Lydia goes missing, and a lot of things happen that she isn't included in.

“So are you going?” Allison sat next to me in our English class, grinning widely.

“Going where?”

“Winter formal?” Allison tried.

I shifted in my seat, “no. I’d feel weird about it. I’d rather not have a front row seat for couples city.”

Allison opened her mouth to interject, probably to offer Lydia’s help with finding a date.

“and I’d rather not go on a date with someone I don’t know.”

Allison’s mouth snapped shut and she nodded. “I can understand that. When I first came here I had a plan not to date, but that didn’t work out so well.”

I pointed my pen at her, “they always say that when you’re not looking you find it.”

“True.” Allison nodded, dropping the conversation as a distracted looking Scott entered the room, taking his seat behind her followed closely by Stiles.

 -

“Hey Stiles, did you write down the pages for… and you’re gone.” I sighed as the back of Stiles’ shirt disappeared through the crowded hallway, “I guess I’ll just ask Allison in French then?”

I caught Scott as he came out of the classroom looking jittery. He jumped when I slid into his line of vision.

“Hey, Scott? What’s up with Stiles? He’s been avoiding me, I think?” I pouted, putting on what I hoped was a doe-eyed expression.

“What was that you said to be a while back? Oh yeah, the confused puppy thing works for you but not on me.”

“That’s abridged.” I rolled my eyes.

“I don’t think he’s avoiding you, he just has this thing about hanging out with hot girls.”

“Am I a hot girl?”

Scott continued as if he didn’t hear me, “He thinks it’s the kiss of death and automatically puts him in the gay best friend category.”

“Well news flash, Scott. Some girls actually like to hang out with a guy and get to know.”

“Isn’t that what dating is for? Getting to know someone?” Scott made a face.

“Oh Scott, that’s adorable.” I patted his cheek, immediately I realized how weird that was and awkwardly retracted my hand. “Technically yeah, but as a partner. For some girls, yeah dating is how they get to know people. But others prefer to find out if they can be friends first, what’s a boyfriend if there’s no ‘friend’? Then it’s just ‘guy that I occasionally sleep’ or whatever. It totally depends on the girl.” I started walking backwards, waving my hands around as I talked.

“Why are girls so complicated?” Scott sighed.

“Uh. Have you looked inside your own head lately? Or that of your friend’s?”

Scott sighed, “Point taken.”

“I have to get to class, but if you see that friend of yours, you might want to pass along the wisdom.” I bounced on my heels, spinning around.

“Nah, I’d rather see him learn on his own.”

“Horrible, but I can accept that.” I called over my shoulder. Walking away I could hear Scott laughing.

Stiles was indeed very good at avoiding me. I didn’t even see him most of the day and when I did he was very obviously pretending to be busy.

At lunch I sat across from Scott in Stiles’ usual seat, after I’d said a quick hello to Boyd and offhandedly told him I had to deal with Stiles’ weirdness today. He’d nodded and tried to hide a smile by fitting a whole Dorito in his mouth, waving me off.

“You do realize now I’m going to refer to all of Stiles and mine’s interactions as ‘hanging out’ right?” I said continuing the earlier conversation.

“You do realize that you’re going to make him think you’re friendzoning him right?” Scott gave me that sad puppy look.

 

“Cut it out, puppy dog eyes.”

“I think I walked into this conversation at the wrong time.” Allison sat down next to Scott. She scrunched up her face. “What are you guys talking about?” 

Scott and I answered simultaneously, “Stiles,” “Friendzones.”

I rolled my eyes, “Tell him that a lot of girls really like to hang out with a guy before they go all exclusive and date them.”

“How’s this about Stiles?”

“What’s about Stiles?” of course Stiles would pick that moment to show his face.

“Nothing’s about Stiles.” I groaned, feeling agitated.

Scott grinned impishly, "tell her that hanging out with guys is a relationship killer."

“Why can’t people just be friends?!”

“You’re such a vigilante.” Stiles patted my shoulder.

“Seriously?! You don’t see girls moaning about it. I guess I'm moaning about it now, but, ugh.” I felt my face burning, desperate to end the conversation. “And _you_ have been avoiding me.” I pointed at Stiles, who almost choked on his curly fries.

“Meh?”

“Yes you.” I sighed. “I’m going sit with Boyd, leave you to... whatever. I’ll see you in French” I nodded to Allison. I took a few deep breaths on the way to the other table, with a clearer head I was already regretting the entire conversation.

“Back already?” Boyd smirked when I sat down rather roughly.

“I’m annoyed.”

“He’s staring at you so whatever you did worked.”

I glanced over Boyd’s shoulder, he was right, Stiles was staring at me.

“I don’t know how you knew that, but stop it.” I cocked my head at Boyd.

“I can practically feel his eyes burning a hole in this table.” Boyd snorted.

“Yeah well. Try not to feel it, alright, BattleStar.”

“Nerd.” Boyd coughed, grinning.

“And proud.”

“No wonder you and Stilinski hang out.” Boyd smirked. I just rolled my eyes.

* * *

 

The next Monday I found myself a bit grumpy thanks to the traffic jam on the way to school and sitting on the bleachers watching the lacrosse team practice. According the to girls a few seats up, apparently over the extended weekend Lydia Martin had been seriously injured at the winter formal that I hadn’t gone to, their theories were wild and ranged from a bad reaction to some party drug to someone attacking her with a baseball bat. The whole situation with Lydia was why Stiles had disappeared and been distracted for a few days of school, or so he said when he finally decided to stop avoiding me long enough to relay the information.  Last night she disappeared from her hospital room, and according to the series of horribly misspelled texts from Stiles, him and Scott spent the whole night looking for her with Scott and Allison, who is currently Scott's sort of secret girlfriend.  He also passed along that Allison's Aunt Kate was killed the night of formal, something Allison was handling roughly.

On top of all that, there was a Biology test today and Harris is a hardass, PLUS word around the school is that today’s Allison’s aunt’s funeral and people have been being less than kind about it. It seemed like it would be a bad day all around.

By the end of the day I had heard at least 3 different scenarios from Stiles about Lydia, and how to secretly attend Allison’s aunt’s funeral.

“Honestly I don’t know what to tell you,” I shrugged, “ I don’t know Allison all that well. I mean, we talk a little when we see each other, we have French together and we help each other out and stuff but…”

“Well.” Stiles’ head bobbed, “I think you two would get along. But you’re right. We should probably wait till after the funeral settles down for you two to become buddies. Maybe even Lydia too.”

“Yeah.” I tried to sound a little enthusiastic about it, but judging by the look on Stiles face I was failing. “So how did you get detention again?”

Stiles let out a loud groan. “Harris hates me.”

“Well have fun with that then.”

“You wanna come to detention with me?”

“Uh, yeah I don’t think so.”

“But… Harris might go easier on me.”

“If you really think that Harris likes me then you’re out of your mind.”

“But you’re a good student…”

“And you’re not Mr. Straight A’s.”

“Fine. Point.”

“Besides, after today’s test, I’d rather throw myself in the middle of a dubstep alpha brawl than spend any more time in that room.”

“Dub…step…what?” Stiles said slowly to himself, then he shook his head, “whatever, okay you’re right. That test was killer. Did I tell you that Jackson left in the middle of it. Bleeding black. It was weird.”

“You’re going to be late for detention.” Stiles was definitely stalling, “and then you’re going to get another detention.”

Stiles groaned, and spun around on his heel. “Fiiiiiiiiine. I’m going.”

“I’ll talk to you later.” I said sweetly, waving at Stiles' back.

Stiles spun around to shoot me a disgruntled look, my eyes widened as Stiles walked backward into a trashcan.

“You okay?” I started toward where he was now sprawled on the ground. 

“I’m fine. I’m fine.” Stiles hopped up and hurried down the hall, “See you later!”

I stopped at my locker to drop off a few books. I waved at Allison as I passed by her. She nodded weakly in acknowledgement.

“Not her sister, her aunt, the one who murdered all those people.” I heard a girl whispering, she wasn’t very good at the concept of whispering.

“You mean the crazy bitch who killed all those people?” another girl answered. I frowned and glanced over at Allison, who had gone tense and still at her locker. She could clearly hear what those two gossips where saying.

“Yeah, the fire, all those animal attacks, it was her aunt.”

“Are you kidding? I sit next to her in English.” I frowned, _I_ sit next to her in English.

“Fine a new seat.” The other girl giggled.

My body went hot with anger. I was hardly best friends with Allison but it was wrong to let them talk like that. I huffed and slammed my locker shut.

“Hey, Perez Hiltons 1 and 2,  _I_ sit next to Allison in English, not you. If you knew what was good for you, you’d both keep your gossiping traps shut, not everything you hear is some part of your own little entertainment bubble. People have lives and feelings. How would you like it if I stood across the hall from you and called your mom a crazy bitch?”

“What are you going to do about it?” the first girl snorted.

“Well for starters I've taken several self defense classes and I could take both of you down in 3 seconds.” I said in an overly peppy voice.

One of the girls made a face and tugged at her friends arm.

I'd learned enough about BHHS's social hierarchy to know that my next threat would hit hard. “And if I hear you talking more shit, I’ll go have a few words with Lydia Martin, I’m sure she can ruin your lives in ways I can’t do physically.”

Both girls blanched and scurried off.

I made eye contact with Allison, she gave me a sad smile of thanks and walked off. I watched Allison walk off, what I highly suspect was Scott’s arm popped out of a classroom and yanked Allison inside. Sighing, I decided Allison was better off with him than wondering out of the school upset, and walked out of the school to my car.

After being home all of 5 minutes, I was too antsy and aggravated to stay around.

“Aunt Liz?” I called through the house. No response. So she was either held up in her office and couldn’t hear me or not here, as usual. I scribbled a note to let her know I was home and where to find me before making my way upstairs.

I changed out of my school clothes and made my way into the detached garage gym that Aunt Liz had the time to convert, but never really used except for the first week of January, and took to the treadmill. The music pumping through my headphones was enough to mute any other sounds, so when I caught movement out the corning of my eye I nearly fell off the treadmill.

“S-stiles?” I yanked out the headphones, doubling over to catch my breath as the treadmill turned off.

“Yeah, hey.” Stiles lifted one hand feebly. “Your aunt said you were here…so.”

“I’m surprised she’s actually home.” I breathed, adjusting the top of my shorts over the bottom of my loose top, pulling them up a little.

“Yeah. Me too.” Stiles laughed a little, “I think I’ve seen her twice now since you’ve moved here.”

“So, um.” I sat on the edge of the treadmill, Stiles sat next to me a little higher on the incline bouncing his leg. I checked the time, it was after midnight. “What…um, why are you looking for me?"

“Oh. Uh. Right. So. I thought you'd want to know. We found Lydia.” 

“Oh.” I looked up, one shoe in my hand. “That…that’s great.”

“Yeah.” Stiles’ head bobbed, “tonight’s going to be really cold.”

I nodded absentmindedly, taking off my other shoe. “Yeah. She was running around in a hospital gown right?”

“No. uh. She was naked.” Stiles said absently.

“Oh.”

“Yeah.” Stiles nodded again, playing with his fingers.

"I can understand why that would be traumatizing for you."

Stiles was silent. 

“Stiles.” I paused, “are you okay? Is Lydia okay?” 

“No. I’m fine. Lydia’s fine.” Stiles nodded. “Last I saw of her my dad was escorting her to an ambulance to be checked out by the hospital. Yeah, she’s going to be fine. I mean it’s Lydia. So.”

"Well that's good." I glanced at the clock again. "Hey, I don't want to be rude, but it's really late. I'm sure you've had a long day, what, between Harris and Lydia and your plan to sneak into a funeral."

Stiles nodded and stood up. He held open the door and I ducked under his arm into the hallway. He flicked the lights off and closed the door behind us. Slowly I walked with Stiles to his Jeep.

“I bet you’re glad Lydia’s safe and sound then."

“Yeah.” … “I, I mean I’m glad she’s safe. There’s been too many crazy things happening around here.”

“Is she… okay in the… supernatural sense?” I asked lightly, almost afraid to tread on that one.

“Uh.” Stiles rubbed his head, “I think, she… she was bit, but, she’s not showing any signs of turning, nor is she showing any signs of… well, dying.”

I shivered a bit when a big gust of wind blew around, pelting my bare arms with leaves. Stiles shrugged off his jacket.

“Here.”

“Stiles it’s fine. The house is right there.”

“No, really.” Stiles held it up to me, trying to encourage me to put my arms through the sleeves. I sighed and shoot my head at him, but complied. Stiles slid the jacket up around my shoulders.

“How was the funeral?”

“Well, that’s kind of how we wound up finding Lydia.” Stiles leaned up against the side of his car at my shoulder.

“You want to elaborate?” I leaned my head back to look up at him.  
Stiles looked down at me and smirked, “you’re really short.”

“Shut up, I'm a normal height, the ground is uneven.” I smacked him in the chest. “What happened? Because Allison was really worked up at the end of the day.”

Stiles nodded, shit-eating grin still on his face. “Right, Scott and I got caught by my dad hiding behind this statue thing. There were cameras everywhere. Anyway my dad tossed us in the back of his car and then he got a 5-1-5-Adam, that’s a…”

“Disturbance in a car.” I nodded, Stiles looked a little dumbfounded, I shrugged.

“Right. Uh, but someone attacked an ambulance, blood everywhere. So Scott and I snuck out of the car and went through the woods. He caught Lydia’s scent and ran off, my dad showed up and caught me there. I got a stern talking to, then I spotted Lydia, just walking out from the line of trees. It was almost like she was in a trance or something and then she snapped out of it.”

I unconsciously moved closer Stiles leaning against the Jeep next to him, my legs felt numb.

“I hope Allison’s okay.”

“From what Scott said she didn’t even want to go to the funeral. I think she’s fine. Just a little shaken up from what everyone else has been saying. But from what Scott says, you really took care of that today.”

I shrugged, “those girls shouldn’t have been gossiping like that. And that loudly. It’s what anyone with common decency would do.”

“From what I heard you threatened to kick their asses into the next super moon?” Stiles smirked again, leaning more against my shoulder.

“Maybe.” I shrugged, looking down at my feet. My legs were full of goosebumps

You’re shaking.” I jumped a little at how close Stiles’ voice was, “we should probably go home. I mean… each of us… uh… going to our own homes?”

I nodded, biting my lip. Awkward goodbye time after awkward supernatural conversation time.

“I’ll, see you at school?”

“Yeah. Definitely. I’ll see you there.” Stiles backed up, tripping on his own feet for a second before he caught himself.

“I’ll bring your jacket to school.”

“Nah. It’s fine. I’ll come pick it up one day. Maybe Sunday? We can watch movies? Or you can come over and we can watch movies, I’m not inviting myself over or anything, I just thought we could hang out? So yeah. I’ll text you. you can come over Sunday and we can watch Batman or something.” Stiles rambled.

I nodded, sliding into my seat. “I’d like that. Bye, Stilinski.”

“Later, Taylor.” Stiles waved at me as I made my way into the house. I shivered in the sudden burst of heat and watched Stiles climbing into his jeep before closing the door and locking it.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Where Stiles gets to act like a normal teenager for a minute.

When I pulled up to the Stilinski residence on Sunday, I sent him a quick text letting him know I was here. The front door was flung open before I could put both feet outside of my car.

“Hey, Stilinski.”

“Taylor.” Stiles nodded, ushering me inside once I’d made it up to the front door. Stiles shut the door behind me and I followed him, looking around the house. The first thing I noticed was that the Stilinski residence was cooler than average, but overall comfortably lived in.

 “Dad, you remember Ellison.”

I jumped a little at Stiles’ voice and turned to face Stiles and his dad.

Mr. Stilinski nodded in recognition, “Ellison. So this is why you…” Stiles cut his dad off with several spastic hand gestures that he clearly didn’t want me to notice. Mr. Stilinski held up a hand. “Alright, alright. So what are you kids planning to do today?” He raised an eyebrow at Stiles.

“Well, sir. Stiles has promised me a Batman marathon. And I hope he delivers because I’ve been living off Dark Knight and the 1989 Batman.” I said, pulling both Batman movies out of my bag, “oh and I brought Iron Man, he’s kind of the Marvel version of Batman anyway.” I shrugged, I figured Mr. Stilinski didn’t need to know about the dog-eared book of lore I’d dug up.

Stiles and his dad looked a little stunned.

Mr. Stilinski recovered first faster than the starry-eyed Stiles, “nice to know someone shares in my son’s interests then.” He laughed, “well I’m off to the station. Stiles.” Mr. Stilisnki pointed a finger at Stiles, who nodded vigorously.

“I know. I know.”

“You two have fun watching,” he motioned to the movies in my hands, “that.”

I mock saluted Mr. Stilinski. He laughed, shaking his head and headed out the door. I turned on my heels to face Stiles.

“So. Movies?” I waved the three in my hand at Stiles. He snorted.

“Yeah come on. I have every Batman from 1989 to now, except Dark Knight.”

“I guess we’ll see how many we can get through. In order. Of course.”

“Of course.” Stiles grinned, pulling a hand full of DVDs out and putting them on the sofa.  “Popcorn? Soda?”

“Sure. I brought some with me too, if you run out or whatever. Can’t be too careful.” The awkwardness had a settled in a little knowing that we were here alone, but I tried to push that to the back of my mind.

“You’re prepared.” Stiles laughed.

“Well you have to be when you’re watching movies.”

Stiles nodded, retreating to the kitchen. “Put the first one in the DVD player while I pop this?”

“Sure.”

I quickly set the DVDs down in order, Batman, Batman Returns, Batman Forever, Batman and Robin, then Batman Begins. I plucked up the first one and put the disk into the player. Stiles came out of the kitchen with a large bowl of popcorn and two sodas.

“Um. Make yourself comfortable.” Stiles nodded, sitting on the sofa and setting down the popcorn and soda on the coffee table.

I stacked up the DVDs  and set them down on the corner coffee table near Stiles, and kicked off my shoes, putting them and my bag under the table and out of the way before curling up on the sofa.

“I also did a little research.” I started tentatively, sinking into the corner of the couch.

“Yeah? Hit me.”

“On bites and not turning.” I pulled out the worn book and found the page. “This legend isn’t exactly the same, but it tells the story of a boy who was bitten by an animal following him, he killed it, and then started vanishing from his bed late at night. No one knew, of course. Part of the curse in this version is that he couldn’t tell anyone. Eventually his family noticed gaps of time when he’d disappear from his bed, but by that time he was found dead on the side of the road.”

Stiles made a face “What else is in there?”

“Well I highly doubt that Scott or Lydia have broken Lent for seven years straight, that’s a common one, it usually leads to the person affected hunting down others who have broken Lent. And I don’t think that either of them sold their souls to a witch.”

“Not as far as I know.” Stiles shook his head, grinning, then his expression dropped. “Witches aren’t real are they?”

I shrugged, “depends on your definition. But probably. So my best guess is night time roaming.”

“She was under twenty four seven surveillance at the hospital. I think people would notice if she had just started leaving in the middle of the night.”

I shrugged, "it isn't foolproof, just an idea, something to look out for."

"Something to look out for." Stiles echoed.  He was getting comfortable on the other end of the sofa, playing with the remote. “Um, I can get you a hoodie or something if you want, it can get kind of cold in here.” 

“I’m fine. But if I get cold I’ll take you up on that.” I figured that the house couldn't get colder, if anything I'd get used to the current cool-ness.

Halfway through Batman Forever I found out what Stiles meant by it getting cold in the Stilinski house. Good bumps had broken out down my legs and arms, and I could just make out the bumps along my legs through the leggings that I was wearing. I played it off by snuggling deeper into the corner of the sofa that I was in, pulling my legs up and tucking my feet under Stiles’ calves for warmth. He had long since stretched out across the sofa after making sure I was okay with it. I pushed it out of my head for the rest of the movie, trying to focus on Batman instead of Stiles or the cold air.

When the movie ended, Stiles and I both stretched a bit, yawning and rubbing our faces.

“I’m going to go make some more popcorn, maybe order a pizza? You want anything in particular?"

“Uh. Not really. I can just pick of whatever, as long as you’re not one of those anchovies and mushroom types.”

“Gross. No.” Stiles laughed, standing up and stretching, I caught the sliver of stomach that showed when his shirt lifted, why is it that that strip of skin always draws eyes. “I was thinking more meat lovers or triple cheese.”

I nodded, “yeah, let me know how much and I’ll chip in.”

“No way.” Stiles laughed. “I’ve got this.”

“Seriously? Are we going to play that game.” I rolled my eyes, standing up. “Okay we’re going to settle this after you order and I use the bathroom?”

“Oh right, down that way, first door on the right.” Stiles pointed out the direction I needed to go.

“Thanks.” I started off down the hall, “when I come back we’re settling this.”

“No we’re not. There’s nothing to settle!” Stiles called out.

When I came back into the living room I got a face full of fabric. I pulled the maroon fabric off of my face and frowned at Stiles. Stiles raised an eyebrow at me, phone to his ear. When he hung up the phone, he looked at me again.

“I know you’re cold. I’m cold. And I’m wearing a lot more layers than you are.” Stiles shoved his phone in his pocket and pulled out his wallet, taking out a few bills. “and no you’re not paying for anything.”

“Not even the tip?” I asked, pulling the hoodie over my head.

“Nope.” Stiles’ grinning face came into sight as I pulled the hoodie down. I scowled at him.

“Next time I buy then.”

“We’ll see about that.”

I curled up on the sofa again. Stiles tossed a blanket over both of our legs.

“Should we start the next movie? Or wait for the pizza so it doesn’t interrupt?”

Stiles looked around a little, “we should probably wait then I guess. Batman doesn’t like interruptions.”

“Batman does not.” I said in my best Christian Bale batman voice, which wasn't even that close. Stiles’ face lit up anyway.

“Not bad.”  Stiles nodded. “You know I almost forgot what it was like to just hang out with someone and be normal.”

“Too much werewolf stuff?”

“I keep forgetting you know. Not just that, but yeah, now that I think about it. Most of it does revolve around those wolves.” Stiles rubbed his hand over his head.

“I guess that’s the price you pay when your best friend is a teenage werewolf.” I laughed as the doorbell rang.

“Pizza.” Stiles cheered, grabbing his wallet and bolting toward the door. His feet got tangled in the blanket and he face-planted on the floor.

“Oh my god. Are you okay?” I jumped up and pulled Stiles up.

“I’m fine.” Stiles stood up and shuffled, “can we forget that happened?”

“What happened?” I grinned.

Stiles snapped his fingers and nodded, the doorbell rang again.

“Oh right. I’ll be right back.”

I nodded and snuggled down on the couch into Stiles’ hoodie.

“Thanks man.” I heard Stiles closing the front door. I didn’t have to wait long for the Stilinski in question to reappear. He moved around the sofa, grinning. “And now we have pizza.” He set down the pizza box and handed me a napkin. Once we both had a slice, Stiles leaned back on the sofa. “Shall we continue?” I nodded.

By the time Mr. Stilinski came home, Stiles and I were laying across the sofa, my feet tucked up against Stiles’ hip and his pressed against my waist keeping me on the sofa, both of us where buried under the blanket and half asleep, the pizza sitting half finished in it’s box.

“Next time we should marathon Hemlock Grove or The Gates.”

“What’s that?” Stiles mumbled sleepily.

“Uh. They’re both sort of werewolf shows, with, like, vampires and succubus....es… succabi? What’s the plural of succubus?”

“No idea.” Stiles hummed. One of his feet slipped off the edge of the sofa and the other swung out and hit my stomach.

“Ow!”

“Sorry! Sorry!”

I groaned. Stiles’ face went a more visible shade of red.

“Uh. Kids?”

Stiles and I both jerked.

“Uh, hey…dad.” Stiles looked at me wide eyed.

“Hey, Mr. Stilinski. What’s up?”

“You tell me.”

“How about we offer you some pizza and we don’t speak of this again?”

“Elli!” Stiles protested.

“What?!”

“Stiles doesn’t like me eating things that are greasy.” Mr. Stilinski rolled his eyes. He walked around and took a slice from the box before Stiles could get up and stop him. “Thank you, Ellison.”

“Anytime, Mr. Stilinski!” I nodded at Mr. Stilinski’s retreating back. Stiles glared at me. “Dude. Come on.” Stiles’ glare intensified. “Stiles.” He crossed his arms. I snorted and sat up, resting my forearms on his thighs. “Seriously. It’s one slice. Pizza’s been dubbed a vegetable. I’m serious. Google it!” I dug a finger into Stiles’ side, making him squirm. I was jerked forward and landed on my face against Stiles’ lower ribs. “Ow. Stop hurting me.”

“Sorry.” Stiles sighed, pulling on my upper arms. I straightened out and was laying between Stiles and the sofa back. Stiles cleared his throat, “uh. Hi.”

“Hi.”

“So, um.” Stiles jerked back a little.

“Well this is comfy.” I snuggled under Stiles arm, “a lot warmer too.”

“I… uh… yeah.” I felt Stiles’ body relax. “What time do you have to be home?”

I glanced at the large wall clock, “probably in an hour or two. Before it gets too dark.”

Stiles nodded, moving his hand to rest awkwardly on my shoulder. “We have time for the last Batman.”

“Let’s do it.” I cheered.

Stiles leaned over to grab the remote and pulled me with him. “Sorry.” Stiles mumbled, leaning back to his original place.

“It’s fine.” I snorted, resting my head on Stiles’ shoulder.

Stiles hummed a little noise of contentment and pressed play on the remote.

During the duration of the movie, Mr. Stilinski moved in and out of the room, and judging from the shuffling sounds, he was messing with papers. Once or twice I saw Mr. Stilinski out the corner of my eye watching us. Stiles’ hand relaxed on my shoulder and at some point his other hand rested on my hip, holding me closer to him., though the latter point I didn’t realize until the credits were rolling.

“Something about watching all these movies makes a person really tired.” I yawned.

Stiles yawned seconds later, “I feel like I could sleep for a week.”

“Too bad you can’t. School tomorrow.”

“and Scott’s shit.” Stiles grumbled under his breath.

I groaned, “yeah. Scott’s shit. And suddenly I’m not looking forward to going to sleep.”

Stiles snorted, “You’re telling me.”

I awkwardly put my hand on Stiles’ hip and pushed myself up, yawning. “I should probably get going.”

Stiles waited until I was sitting up to stand and offer me a hand. I gathered up my things and put on my shoes, helping Stiles clean up a bit.

“It’s fine. I’ll get it.” Stiles kept trying to stop me from straightening up. 

“Hey. I helped make this mess.” I gave Stiles’ shoulder a playful shove that might have been harder than intended. He laughed and stumbled a bit.

“I’ll walk you out.”

“Leaving, Ellison?” Mr. Stilinski appeared in the doorway.

“Yes, sir.” I nodded, “can’t be too tired for school tomorrow.”

“I’ll be right back, dad. I’m walking Elli out to her car.”

Mr. Stilinski nodded at his son, grinning. “Drive safe, Ellison.”

“Goodnight, Mr. Stilinski.”

Stiles closed the door behind us. “I hope he doesn’t lock me out.” Stiles laughed, swinging his arms around at his sides.

“Well knowing you, you have a way to break into your own house. You seem like the type to know how to pick locks, and if not, well, I’d suggest you learn. You never know when that might come in handy.”

“Yeah. I don’t think my dad would be too thrilled, but he’d probably not be surprised.”

I tossed my bag into my car and leaned against the side. “Oh, your jacket.” I pulled it out of the backseat, “and I’m wearing your hoodie.” I handed Stiles his jacket from the other night and started to peel off the hoodie.

“It’s fine. Ell.”

“No.” I laughed, peeling it off the rest of the way. “I’m totally going to forget to give it back to you otherwise.”

“Eh,” Stiles shrugged, folding the hoodie and jacket over his shoulder. “I know where you live.”

I snorted, “I’ll see you at school tomorrow. You and Scott have morning practice right?”

Stiles nodded, backing up. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> semi-edited


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this one's following Shape Shifted, we're slowly starting to follow the episodes more; sorry if it's kinda crappy.

Monday mornings were always a drag. But today the school was side tracked by the return of the great Lydia Martin. To top it off, Scott was freaking out, according Stiles’ hurried whispers to me before Coach called him onto the line to throw balls at Scott. Worst part was, there was a new werewolf, newly bitten, uncontrollable, werewolf. Stiles had quickly and quietly told me that Scott hated playing goal but he was in it today to sniff out the wolf and then ran off to talk to Coach, only to return and shove goalie gear into Scott’s arms.

“Let’s go! Line it up!” Coach Finnstock blew his whistle.

Danny flashed me a smile as he jogged into the line, I nodded at him but my eyes locked on Stiles as Danny passed him. My eyes jerked away from watching him when Scott crashed into someone, abandoning the goal and blowing past the defenders.

“MCCALL!”

“Yeah?”

“Usually the goalie stays in the vicinity of the actual goal!” Coach yelled, the kid Scott’ talked walked off looking at Scott weirdly. “Let’s try it again!”

And once again Scott barreled into someone. I was no expert on lacrosse, I was more of a soccer person myself, but I’m pretty sure you don’t leave the goal to tackle someone.

“MCCALL! The position’s goal keeper! Not goal abandoner!”

“Sorry Coach.” Scott didn’t sound sorry at all.

“Let’s go!” Coach wondered over to Stiles in the line and pulled on his face guard. I could hardly hear what Coach was saying but it sounded like he was asking him what was wrong with Scott, and Stiles was letting him know all about Scott’s academic and physical downfalls.

Scott rammed down Danny this time, practically landing on top of him, and gave him a pretty big sniff. Well that looks kind of awkward. I cringed.  Stiles caught my eye from his spot in the line but I couldn’t tell what he was saying.

“MCCALL! You come out of the goal one more time and you’ll be doing suicide runs till you die. It’ll be the first ever suicide run that actually ends in a suicide. Got it?”

“Yes, Coach.”

Jackson started clutching his shoulder, looking uneasy, he moved out of the line. This time Scott rammed into a kid with Lahey on the back of his jersey, who was right in front of Stiles in the line, and then things went downhill fast. The both landed on all fours facing each other. And then Stiles’ dad showed up in full police attire, looking like he just walked off the set of CSI, to talk to the kid. Scott and Stiles huddled together, talking quietly, but knowing those two it wasn’t as much of a whisper as they thought it was.  The team was sent to the locker rooms to change.

I waited for Stiles and Scott to come out of the locker room, of course the two of them walked right pass me when they came out, lost in their own conversation.

“Why would Derek choose Isaac?”

“Peter told me that if the bite doesn’t turn you it could kill you, and maybe teenagers have a better chance at surviving.

“Doesn’t being a teenager mean your dad can’t hold him?

“Well, not unless they have solid evidence, or a witness. Wait, Danny! Where’s Jackson?” Stiles jogged up behind Danny, both boys still ignoring me, Danny caught my eye and I rolled mine.

“In the principal’s office talking to your dad.”

I groaned and went over to my own class down the hall. Scott and Stiles didn’t even notice. Stiles had some explaining to do later.

“Miss Taylor, will you take this to the office for me. You’re ahead of everyone in the work anyway.”

“Yes ma’am.”

Ms. Chetty handed me a stack of papers. “Thank you, Ellison.”

Heading down the hallway to the office, who else did I spy but the two idiots. Scott and Stiles were leaning close to the door to the office. Both jumped when the door started to open. Stiles grabbed a copy of Us Weekly to hide behind as his dad walked out. I walked over to the empty chair not wanting to just walk into the office.

“Hi, Scott.” Sheriff nodded, he sighed at his son and spied me. “Staying out of trouble Ellison?”

“Yes sir. I have to drop these off.” I waved the papers at him, explaining myself. He nodded and eyed his son again who was now bouncing in his chair side-eying me.

Sheriff Stilinski waved before walking off with the deputy.

“What are you doing here?” Stiles hissed.

“Dropping this off!”

Stiles was cut off by a man coming out of the office.

“Boys, Come in! Ah, I don’t remember there being a young lady on the write up.”

“No, sir. Ms. Chetty sent me down to drop off these papers to the principal.”

“Ah, well thank you. I hope you were finished with your work.” He gently pried the papers from my hand.

“Yes, sir. I’m actually a little ahead of the class.”

“Perfect.”  The man ushered Stiles and Scott into the office, both sent me a concerned glance.

“I’ll just head back to class.” I nodded, starting to walk backwards a little.

“Ah yes. Let’s not keep you from learning.”

As soon as the door was closed I hurried off down the hall. That man gave me the creeps and after class I caught Jackson being a dick to Lydia and Scott nearly plowed me over running out of the school.  I caught Stiles at lunch and pretty much demanded him tell me what happened. He spilled that he got detention that afternoon for beaming Harris with a paper ball, which explained why Harris was so pissy during Biology.

“Please promise me that you won’t get involved with this. I’ll keep you updated and everything, just don’t try and get involved. I don’t think I could live with myself if you were bitten or something by someone newly turned who can’t control themselves.”

“Baby werewolves sound as scary as a mandrake.”

“Except instead of a deadly scream, it’s a deadly bite.”

“Okay,” I sighed, “but let me know if I can help in any way. Got it Stilinski?”

“Got it, Taylor.”

Stiles even made me pinky promise and reminded me of that promise till the end of the day.

“Don’t you have detention, Stilinski?”

Stiles mimicked me in a high pitched voice and frowned. “Yes, yes I do. Are you going home?”

“Yeeeeeeeeees Stiles I’m going home.”

“Stilinski, you can flirt with girls later, get in the class.” Harris’ dry wit never impressed anyone.

“See ya on the flip side, Stilinski.”

Stiles flipped me off when Harris wasn’t looking.

“Mr. Stilinski, I’d like to leave before the world ends.”

Walking out of the school I ran into Allison.

“Hey, Allison.” I waved, “Oh I really like your hair.”

“Thanks.” Allison grinned.

“So, I met the new principal today…”

“Oh, yeah. That’s my grandpa. Gerard.”

“Really? Wow.”

“Yeah I know. I haven’t seen him since I was like, 3, or something.”

“Okay, I’m going to be honest here, he kind of scares me.” I said looking at her wide-eyed.

She shrugged. “No offense taken. Hey have you seen Scott?”

“Yeah he nearly plowed me over running out of the school after his Chem class? Probably something about Isaac and the Sheriff being here. Him and Stiles got set to the principal’s office, as you can predict, to spy on Stiles’ dad.”

Allison chewed on her lip.

“Stiles is too nosey for his own good.” I laughed, trying to side track Allison, “Scott too. But you know what they say, ‘Curiosity killed the cat, but satisfaction brought it back,’ those two take that to heart.”

Allison giggled, “Yeah you’re right. I have to go, I think Lydia and I are studying tonight. if you want you can join?”

“Like Lydia needs to study.” I snorted, Allison shook her head. “Maybe next time?"

She nodded. “Bye, Elli.”

“Bye!”

I got a call from Stiles nearly three hours later, after I’d 

finished next week’s Biology assignment, and half the assigned History reading.

“Hey. Sorry I didn’t answer your texts, Harris had my phone the whole fricken’ time. He’s the worst.”

“Is it just me or was that detention heinously long?”

“Sorry, again. I just got off the phone with Allison, apparently someone’s heading down to the station to kill Isaac with wolfsbane. I have to head down there and head him off.”

“I hope you have something _not_ dumb planned. Something that doesn’t involve punching bullet proof glass?”

“Ha, ha, ha.” Stiles muttered sarcastically. “You’re not letting that one go are you?”

“Nope. And roll back the attitude, Stilinski.”

“Alright, look I have to go pick up Derek, look around and see if you can find anything at all about wolfsbane reversal remedies or I don’t know, anything!”

“Are you trying to keep me busy so I don’t try and come down there to help?”

“No.” Stiles answered a little too quickly. “Okay, maybe! But Scott still doesn’t know that you know and he hasn’t asked. And Derek definitely doesn’t know, or need to know.”

“Someone’s possessive.”

“I just don’t want you getting into something that you can’t get out of.”

“Okay, okay. Go do your Batman thing. I’ll sit here and be Vicki Vale.”

“Aw, no you’re more a Kathy Kane.”

“Batwoman? To be honest I’d rather be BlueBird or Hawkfire. I’m quite good at tennis.”

“As much as I’d love to argue with you about superheroes, and trust me I’d _really_ love to. I have to go. I’m about to pick up Derek.”

“Fine, fine. I’ll argue with myself.”… “Hey, Stiles?”

“Yeah?”

“Be careful.”

“I will. You keep safe too okay?” Stiles adopted a softer tone.

“Okay. Bye Stilinski.”

“Talk to you later, Taylor.”

Instead of sitting by the phone worrying about werewolf business, I took a long shower, and put on a face mask for stress relief. While I let the clay mask dry on my face I sat myself in the kitchen with chips and my laptop. I set up Pandora on the TV’s surround system and set to work dancing about and writing my history paper. Between paragraphs I’d indulge myself in a little home alone stress-reduction dancing.

I was in the middle white girl dancing to “Back That Azz Up” when the lights flickered a bit the way they do when there are a lot of lights on and the downstairs load is too much for more than that and the doorbell is rung.

So, I danced my way to the door, pulling out the few hip hop moves I knew.

“Stiles?”

Stiles stood there with an amused grin, “Uh. Elli? Uh, what’s on your face? I..I mean.” Stiles cleared his throat and adopted a weird tone. “ _Hi_. Hey there.”

“What?” I glanced at the foyer mirror. “Oh, uh face mask. I forgot I had it on, no wonder I can’t move my face too much. Uh. Come in? I’ll be a second.”

Instead of going to the bathroom, I bent over the kitchen sink and rinsed my face off.

“You still have some blue,” Stiles pointed at my face, “Hold on I’ll get it.” He gently wiped his thumb along my hairline, pulling away with a blue thumb.

“Thanks, uh. Here.” I handed him the hand towel I used to dry my face. “So I take it everything went well?”

“Sort of.” Stiles nodded nervously. “Isaac got out, Derek has him. So he’s safe. Uh, is there any reason why you’re listening to Ridin’ Dirty?”

"Oh crap. Sorry! I’ll turn that off.”

Stiles laughed, a little twinkle in his eye. I almost slipped on the hardwood floors hurrying to turn it off.

“Okay. It’s off.” My face felt warm, but that could be because I left the mask on for too long. “Talk to me.”

“Right. So uh, Derek showed up, I almost got killed by one of the Argent’s henchmen, and my dad found me alone in the holding cell room –sans Isaac –and with some brutally injured henchman.”

“Sooooo, you’re grounded?”

“Surprisingly no.” Stiles sat on the sofa.

“Well. That’s good.”

“Yeah, but Derek’s still out biting people, since Scott won’t join him.” Stiles rubbed his head. “We might need to tell Scott that I told you. I think it’s harder on all of us trying to pretend that you don’t know, and not talk about it around you, well in Scott’s case.”

“Yeah. Probably.” Stiles fidgeted.  “What? What else is there?”

“What?”

“Stiles you’re fidgeting. There’s something else isn’t there?”

“I always fidget, I’m a very fidgety person.” I gave Stiles a hard look, “okay, yes there is something else. Allison was attacked, sort of, by this green scaly thing. It had a tail. Scott saved her after breaking out of a freezer, which Allison locked Scott in at the Lahey house.”

“A what? Like a lizard? And wait freezer?”

“I don’t know. It was dark, that’s what Scott said anyway.”

“Why does that not sound good at all.” I frowned.

“Because it definitely isn’t.” Stiles sighed. “Talk to me about something, I don’t know, not werewolf-y?”

“Okay like what?”

“Uh, I don’t know, where’s your aunt? She won’t mind that I’m here?”

“She’s in Huston for the week. So what she doesn’t know won’t hurt her.”

“Oh.”

“So…”  I sat next to Stiles, turning toward him. “What’s up with you and Lydia?”

“Me –me and… Lydia?” Stiles stammered. “Nothing.”

“Who is it then that your dad was talking about to my aunt?”

Stiles sighed, “Lydia.”

“Mhmm.”

“She doesn’t like me. I took her to winter formal, it was a mess. Mostly probably because Allison made her do it as a favor, and we’re back to werewolves.”

“hmm?”

“Winter formal brings this back to werewolves.”

“Uh. I mean I know wolves are associated with winter but how exactly does this relate?” I squinted at Stiles.

He leaned his head back. “She was bitten by Peter at Formal. Nothing happened though, and you know you either turn or die so…”

"Right."

Stiles snorted and held out an arm, motioning for me to scoot over to him. “How about we watch some of that Hemlock Grove or whatever.”

“Uh. We can watch an episode? It’s like midnight and we have school tomorrow.”

“Oh. Right.”

I knocked into Stiles' shoulder, 

“Idiot. You really don’t want to piss off your dad anymore. I’m sure he’s secretly seething.”

“Nah.”

“…Waiting patiently for you to do something little that he can ground you for.”

“You’re being a really awful friend right now.”

“I’m being a very great friend right now. Only the best will tease you about your inevitable downfall while encouraging you to do the thing that will get you in trouble.”

Stiles laughed. “These days I don’t know what I’d do without you, you’re the only one who’s up the supernatural creek without a paddle with me.”

“Alright. One episode.” I sighed playfully. Stiles cheered, hugging me tightly.

“Too tight.” I gasped, laughing.

After the one episode, I had to practically push Stiles out the door.

“I just want to know what happens! What is that creepy lady! Why is that dude so weird! Who’s the werewolf?!” Stiles resisted my pushing, making me lean into him and put all my weight forward.

“We can marathon it another day! Stiles it’s nearly midnight!”

“Okay! Okay!” Stiles whipped around, I lost my balance and fell forward. Stiles caught my waist. “Whoa okay. Okay. I’m going.”

“We can marathon it this weekend okay?”

“Alright, I’m leaving.” Stiles waved over his shoulder.


	7. Chapter 7

P.E. was weird today. This high school had a fricken’ rock wall for their P.E. class? How did Coach spring for this? Wasn’t it some sort of safety hazard? A teacher was fired at my old school for showing an accidental boob in an educational video, and this school gets a rock wall?

I tugged at the bottom of my shorts, these might have been a bad idea to wear today for this, they’re way too short. 

“Stiles, quit staring at her ass.”

“Shut up, Scott, oh my god!” out the corner of my eyes I spotted Allison and Lydia talking.

“You know neither of you are particularly good at whispering.” I frowned, turning on my heels to face them.

Stiles’ face went bright red, Scott burst out laughing doubling over.

“You two are ridiculous.”

“MCCALL, ALLISON, ON THE WALL!” Coach screamed.

I took Scott’s place at Stiles’ shoulder.

“Is he always like that?”

“What?” His face still red but slightly less so.

“Coach? Is he always that intense?”

“Er, yeah, most of the time.”

“I’m sorry… Lacrosse practice must be hellacious.”

Stiles snorted. In the background Coach was yelling at Scott about how he put on the harness.

I laughed as the pair started up the wall. “He’s totally trying to just stare at her.”

“Oh Scott.”

“You’d think he’d learn. Especially after you were just called out for that.”

Stiles made a weird sort of choking noise. “Sorry.”

I shrugged. Scott fell down the rock wall, making the class laugh and Coach make a comment about enjoying Scott’s pain. Allison was much more graceful about the decent.

“Ellison, Lydia. Wall!” Coach Finnstock was a bit softer calling the pair of us.

“Try not to fall, Taylor.” Stiles bumped my shoulder.

“Try not to stare at any more asses, Scott might get jealous.”  I bumped his shoulder back and sauntered off to the wall, tying my hair up in a messy bun.

Lydia and I exchanged pleasantries while we put on the harnesses but not much else, we talked a bit in classes and I’d gotten to know her but we held a bit of a friendly rivalry. I found myself tugging at the bottom of my shorts once the harness was secure.

“Ready?” Coach blew his whistle sending Lydia and I scrambling up the wall.

A few feet off the ground, Lydia and I found ourselves neck in neck and getting very competitive.

“I must say I’m impressed, Taylor. I wouldn’t think someone with such small arms could manage.”

“I’d say the same about you, Martin, but you might break a nail yet.”

My hand slipped a little going to grab the next hold making Lydia laugh a little, I quickly shut her up when I swung myself up even more and grabbed a higher hand hold.

“Are you kidding me?” Lydia grumbled. Her foot slipped a couple of times, giving me a slight advantage on height.

“Yes!” I hit the bell at the top, Lydia smacking it a second later.

“Alright you two, down!” Coach yelled. Lydia and I became aware of the silence in the gym. Lydia was brave enough to look back at the class, I couldn’t, I’d freak out. So I just leaned back a little and let my weight lower me down slowly.

“Uh, wow, you’re really good at that.” Stiles said when I returned to the group.

“Yeah well if I had looked down, I certainly wouldn’t have been.”

“Scared of heights?” Allison frowned.

“Scared of falling from them” I corrected.

“There’s a difference?” Scott’s head cocked to the side in the confused puppy look.

“Of course there is.” Lydia rolled her eyes.

I changed the subject, “I’m still shocked that they even allow this in a high school."

“STILINSKI! Erica! Wall!” Coach yelled.

“Try not to stare at any asses.” Stiles whispered as he walked pass. I felt my face heat up.

“You two are so stinkin’ cute.” Scott grinned.

“Shut it, McCall.” I sang back at him. “Didn’t I hear that he’s been in love with Lydia for like forever?” Lydia and Allison were out of earshot talking about Erica’s epilepsy. Stiles made it down before Erica had even managed halfway, and was celebrating at the base of the wall. I shook my head.

“So?” Scott shrugged. “He told me what the two of you overheard his dad talking about to your Aunt, it really got to him. He’s trying to get over her. Besides, she didn’t treat him the best at Winter Formal, I think he’s realizing that.” Scott’s voice dropped to a low whisper. On the wall Erica started to shake, distracting both of us from the conversation at hand.

“Erica? You dizzy? Is it vertigo?”

“Vertigo’s a dysfunction of the vestibular system of the inner ear.” Lydia rattled off matter of fact-ly. “She’s just freaking out.”

“Erica?”

“I’m fine.”

“Coach, maybe it’s not safe. You know she’s epileptic.”

“Why doesn’t anybody tell me this stuff?” Scott and I exchanged glances, everyone knew about Erica. “I have to get...Erica, y –you’re fine, just, just kick off from the wall. There’s a mat to catch you. come on. See you’re fine.”

Coach Finnstock really needs to work on his idea of a soothing tone, the way he was talking to Erica wouldn’t make anyone want let you ease them down.

Scott put his hand on my arm, gently pulling me back to give Erica and Coach some space as she came down and Erica made her way out of the gym. Most of the class laughing in her wake.

“She’ll be okay.” I whispered, more to myself than anything.

“Yeah, but panic attacks suck.”

“Yeah, they do.” I frowned, “even more when people laugh at you for it.”

“Alright everyone!” Coach started ushering kids out of the way, “go get dressed. In the locker room, no one wants to see that Greenburg!”

I rolled my eyes and let Allison loop her arm through mine and pull me to the locker room.

Wiggling around to peel my sports bra off of my regular one, I turned to Allison, “Hey where’s Erica?”

“You know I don’t know why you wear that thing.” Lydia eyed the sports bra in my hand, “boys like a little jiggle.”

“yeah well I’d rather not expose myself while doing jumping jacks. Or get a black eye from my own boobs doing sprints.” I frowned at her, shoving the bra into my sports back and pulling on my Batman shirt. Lydia frowned. I rolled my eyes and turned to Allison.

“I don’t know. Maybe she’s in the showers changing?”

“Something just doesn’t feel right. It's not right for Erica to be so ostracized.” I shrugged, sliding off my shorts and stuffing them in my bag. I pulled on my leggings and turned to Lydia to say something and stopped. There was a bang from the gym.

“What?” Allison’s hand landed on my shoulder.

“Did you hear that?”

Allison and I shared a look and bolted out the door of the locker room.

“Watch our shit, Lydia.” I called over my shoulder.

“Turn her on her side.” Allison yelled, seeing Scott catch Erica as she fell from the rock wall.

I gently grabbed one of Erica’s hands to keep her from accidentally hurting herself. She squeezed my hand.

“It’s okay, Erica.”  I squeezed her hand and gently lifted her head onto my lap. “Someone get Coach.” Stiles knelt on Scott’s other side. “Scott. I’ve got her, go get Coach.”

Allison sat next to me.

“Roll on side, cushion head, do not put anything in mouth, do not restrict movements unless there is a danger. Time the seizure.” I recited to Allison, she nodded watching Erica closely, her mouth moving slowly, timing the seizure. Erica squeezed my hand again.

Allison and I sat with Erica until the ambulance arrived. Even though Erica was lucid enough when Coach ran into the room, he insisted on calling.

“You alright, Erica?”

She nodded, “thanks.”

I nodded, backing up as the medic’s loaded Erica onto a stretcher.

“How’d you know what to do?” Scott looked at Allison and me.

I shrugged, “my, uh, grandma, she used to be a nurse.” I shared a look with Allison, “and it’s good to know, common sense type.”

Stiles’ arm draped over my shoulders. “Well it was good that you two did.” 

“How’d you know?” Allison turned to Scott.

“I don’t know, I just, felt it.”

Neither of them spared me a glance at those comments like they usually would when someone let something vaguely unnatural slip.

“Come on,” I slipped away from Stiles and grabbed Allison’s arm, “let’s go fill in Lydia.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> eh.


	8. Chapter 8

“Hey.” Stiles grabbed my elbow, pulling me aside in the hallway between classes, “are we still on for this weekend? Hemlock marathon? I would have asked this morning, but I didn’t see you before class.” ~~~~

“If you want to? Yeah. As long as nothing furry or reptilian happens to crop up.” I shrugged, “now get to class, Stilinski, or else you’ll end up with detention and no one’s getting to watch Hemlock.” I snorted as I ducked into Bio class, leaving Stiles in the hall.

I sat next to Lydia and tapped my pencil against the corner of my book.

“We’re having a sub today.” She sighed.

“So a video and a pop quiz on it tomorrow.”

“Yep.”

I frowned and opened my notebook as the sub rolled a TV into the room.

“A small exposure on otherwise deadly virus can actually prevent the effects of the infection from spreading. This is called vaccination.”

I scribbled in my notebook and the video droned on, trying to avoid looking at the screen as they showed needles.

“So by creating an immunity, your body is primed to fight off the infection, from Meningitis to rabies from an animal bite… Meaning the subject is now immune.”

I lifted my head to roll my neck and caught Jackson death glaring at Lydia. I narrowed my eyes at him and lowered my head to finish taking notes.

I’d never been more thankful for a class to finish as I was with Biology. Lydia waited for me to follow her out the door to History with Allison. We were hardly out the door when Jackson walked briskly up behind us and grabbed Lydia by the arm.

“What the hell is wrong with you?” he hissed, before he pulled Lydia out of earshot.

I stopped short and watched the scene that Jackson was making. When Lydia broke away from him crying I hurried after her, making sure to knock my shoulder roughly against Jackson’s.

“Lydia?” I pushed open the door to the bathroom. Lydia was standing there in a trance-like state and she walked past me. I frowned and followed her knowing we’d be late for History, I pulled out my phone and sent Allison a quick text to cover for us. Then I followed Lydia down the hall to the trophy case, she stood staring at the basketball trophies.

“Lydia?” she jumped. “Hey let’s get to class. I sent Allison a text, she’s covering for us.”

Lydia nodded and let me drag her to History, mumbling something about a boy in the girls room and how I had to swear not to tell anyone about what I saw between her and Jackson. I didn’t have the heart to tell her that everyone probably saw or knew by now.

~+~

At lunch I sat at Boyd’s table, focusing on the math problems in my notebook instead of Stiles sitting down in front of Boyd.

“Boyd. You got the keys?” Stiles nodded at Boyd, trying to look inconspicuous.

“This isn’t a favor.” The tone Boyd adopted when talking to Stiles almost made me laugh. Stiles tried to pull the keys out of Boyd’s outstretched hand. “It’s a transaction.”

“Right yeah.” Stiles faulted. “Absolutely.” He handed a wad of bills over the Boyd and I pretended not to notice when Boyd caught my eye as if to tell me ‘this kid, I told you.’

He sighed and looked at Stiles hard. “I said 50.”

“Really, I –I remember twenty.” Oh Stiles. “I don’t know I have a very good verbal memory and I remember twenty. I remember that distinct ‘twa’ sound. Tw-enty.”

“I said 50.” Boyd glanced at me again, but this time I was avoiding eye contact and staring at the numbers on the page. “with a ‘fa’ sound. Hear the difference? If you can’t I can demonstrate some other words with the ‘fa’ sound.”

I bit my lip hard to squash the smile on my face.

“Uh, no –no –no.” I managed to get the smile under control to just looking like a concentrated lip bite when Stiles glanced at me from the corner of his eyes. “I think I’m recalling it. No. maybe I just got confused with four-ty.”

Boyd looked impassive when I quickly glanced up at him.

“Come on man, have you see the piece of crap jeep that I drive?”

“You see the piece of crap bus I take?” Boyd glanced at me again and sighed. “Okay, take her, too. I don’t trust you”

“I was going to ask already.” Stiles sighed, glancing at me to see if I was paying attention.

“Ellison.”

“Huh?” I picked up my head, feigning confusion. Boyd smirked.

“Nothing, nothing.” Stiles quickly waved his hands around. “Fifty?”

“Mhmm.”

“Okay.” Stiles glanced at me again and passed Boyd a couple of more bills.

“Thank you.”

“Should I be worried that this is a drug deal?” I waved my pen between the two of them.

Stiles huffed. “Might as well be.”

“I mean I’ve seen a lot of drug deals at my old school. This looked suspiciously like one. Just nothing was …”

Boyd slid a set of keys across the table to Stiles.

“Or should I give them to her?” Boyd jerked his head in my direction.

“Nope. No –no. I can handle it.”

Stiles quickly scooped up the keys from the table. He nodded at me and kind of patted my shoulder a little as he hurried past back to his table with Scott.

I eyed Boyd.

“Dress warm tonight.” Boyd smirked.

“Okay. Where _do_ you work?” I laughed.

“Ice rink.” Boyd waved his fork around. “Just don’t tell Stiles I told you that. Or do.”

“Lips are sealed.” I glanced over at Stiles who was rapid fire talking to Scott and glancing over at me every now and then. Scott caught my eye and smiled, shaking his head.


	9. Chapter 9

The door to the cafeteria flew open, making me break my eye contact with Scott before I could raise my eyebrows at him. I mean I did raise my eyebrows at Scott but it wasn’t about his weird smile and headshake, instead it was about the badass attire Erica now sported. Well that was new. Lydia walked by and slammed her hands on Scott’s table.

“What in Holy. Hell. Is that?”

Erica sauntered around the cafeteria, grabbing and apple and making a bit show of it before leaving.

I glanced at Boyd. “Something weird is going on.” He nodded, eyes still on the door that Erica have left from.

“Hey Boyd.” I spoke softly, afraid to overstep. “You should ask her out.” Boyd’s head snapped in my direction. “Worst she can say is no? and I –I know that’s pretty bad but no’s can turn into yes’s with a little bit of time and persistence.”

“I’m going to pretend you didn’t say that. But thanks.”

I nodded and turned back to my math, trying to stop my curiosity from following Stiles and Scott out of the cafeteria. I sighed and started throwing my things into my bad, Boyd looked up alarmed.

“I can’t concentrate. See you later, Boyd.” He just nodded and waved.

Scott and Stiles were pacing near the front of the school.

“So let me guess,” both boys jumped. “Erica didn’t just suddenly go from a caterpillar to a butterfly on her own, did she?”

Stiles huffed. “No I guess not.”

“DUDE!” Scott threw his hands up.

“Scott. I think it’s time we had a chat. Because this is getting ridiculous.” I sighed. “I know, okay?”

“K–know what?” Scott stammered, eyeing Stiles, who was looking anywhere but his friend.

“About your furry little problem.”

“I –I don’t…”

I cut him off. “Dude, really. Okay my mom teaches Mythology. I grew up on that shit and in an area where voodoo and vampires are considered very, very real things.” I pursed my lips. “besides, when you guys started asking me all those questions the first week I was here, I kind of suspected something was up. You and Stiles aren’t the most subtle of people, and you two suck at whispering.” I shrugged, “I was kind of waiting for you to tell me, but I can see that it’s not going to happen.  So I’m telling you. I know. And I want to help.”

Scott sent Stiles a helpless look and turned back to me, “okay but do you know that Allison’s…”

“Family hunts people who have a furry little problem? Yeah I pieced that one together too.” I hadn’t told Stiles that, but I kind of figured it out when Allison mentioned training with her dad and I saw Principal Gerard with a saber. “Gerard’s not very subtle either.”

Stiles shifted beside us and shuffled forward, “I didn’t know you knew that?”

“Wait you knew that she knew and you didn’t tell me?” Scott frowned at his friend.

“I…”

“I wasn’t going to drag you into this, Stiles.” I sighed. “Yeah he knew I knew, I kind of dragged it out of him a while back, like week one or two. To be fair I already had pretty much figured it out, he just… confirmed. I mean come on, how many people seriously go looking for Dr. Fenris? That night was a whole mess of weird.”

Scott licked his lip. “Okay, so you… told her. And we hardly knew her, she could have been a hunter or something?”

“Scott seriously.” I distracted him from arguing with Stiles. “I’d like to point out that I’ve known for a while now and if I was going to say something to anyone I would have by now. It’s not like anyone would believe me anyway?” then amended, “Except for the Argents. Besides anytime one of you says something remotely strange when I’m around you all freeze up. I’m kind of tired of it.”

Scott groaned, but nodded, giving Stiles a hard look.

“Face it, you have bigger problems to worry about than me knowing.  Like, Erica now has a furry little problem now, at least her epilepsy is probably gone.” I shrugged. “See you in class, boys.”

I walked away from Scott and Stiles with a slight swing in my hips, leaving them at the school’s entrance.  I sat down in front of my hardly used locker to finish math.

There was a squeak from a pair of shoes skidding to a stop in front of me.

“There you are.” Stiles dropped down next to me. “Are you busy tonight?”

“Did you run after me?”

“I –uh, maybe?”

I scribbled down ‘2x’ and looked up at Stiles, who was red in the face and breathing a little hard. “I didn’t go very far.”

“I know. I –I mean I see that now.”

“You ran all over school?”

Stiles’ face went even redder. “No.”

“No.”

“N –no? what?”

“No, I’m not busy tonight.”

“Good.” Stiles was trying to stop a smile. “Want to hang out?”

“Does this have to do with your little drug money transaction with Boyd? Because I’d rather not get involved with a drug cartel. Plus a little birdie told me you don’t do ‘hanging out’ with girls.”

“Kinda.” Stiles stopped short when he realized what he said. “It wasn’t a drug transaction, it was for keys. And –and I’ve changed my mind about that.”

I raised my eyebrows.

“Anyway. It’s nothing illegal. Well, not too illegal. If it was ,my dad is the sheriff in case you’ve forgotten. I can’t do anything above a misdemeanor anyway.” The last part was a joke, I hope.

“Okay, but if I get arrested I’m blaming you. I have a clean record.”

“Noted.” Stiles nodded vigorously. “I’ll pick you up? Around 7?”

“Okay.”

~+~

“A Police enforced curfew will be in effect for the underage in Beacon Hills after the strange deaths that have been cropping up across the city…” and there’s the illegal bit of the night. I groaned and shut off the TV.

Instead of listening to the annoying news anchor I focused on fixing my hair into a perfectly messy fishtail braid over my shoulder and did a quick check in the full length mirror. Loose but not too loose black shirt with sleeves down to the elbow, shorts layered with a pair of black tights with white hearts patterned on them, off white knee high slouchy socks, and black riding boots. Hopefully this was decent enough.

Then it struck me, why was I trying to impress anyone. Why did I want to look good when Stiles picked me up? Usually I couldn’t care less if Stiles saw me in a pair of sweats, let alone get dressed up for a hang out at the ice rink with Lydia, Allison and Scott.  I shook the thoughts out of my head and grabbed for my teal beanie and matching gloves.

When the doorbell rang, I found myself getting nervous. I quickly debated on grabbing a hoodie or not ultimately deciding it would get warmer once I was used to the ice and not grabbing one and hurried down the stairs, trying to keep myself from having an anxiety attack.

“Stiles, hey!” I breathed out, “one second. I’m going to grab my bag it’s in the kitchen.”

Stiles shifted awkwardly over the threshold.

“We just have to pick up Scott from work, Allison and Lydia are meeting us there.”

“So I have to get in the backseat?” I frowned, picking up my purse.

“Not until we pick up Scott.” Stiles shrugged. “One day you’ll probably be able to force him back there.”

I rolled my eyes. “I’ll believe it when I see it.”

“You, uh, you look nice.”

“Thanks. I hope I’m not overdressed or anything.”

“No. no. It’s perfect. I promise.”

Stiles let me play with the radio settings as a sort of apology for having to get in the backseat when we picked up Scott. He managed to take my mind off of being shoved into the backseat, singing loudly along with the songs we knew and pretending to know the ones we didn’t.  Once we reached the clinic, I very slowly moved myself into the backseat, groaning about it the whole time.

“It’s not that bad, Elli.” Stiles groaned.

“Hey guys.” Scott moved into the passengers seat before I could argue, or move my other leg into the backseat. “Ready for some fun!”

“Scott. I hate the backseat.”

Scott pretended not to hear and patted Stiles’ back. “Let’s go yeah?”

“And now we wait some more.” I muttered.

“Allison and Lydia will be here soon.”

“So why Lydia, I mean I get Allison, actually, now that I think about it, why me?”

“Well, Stiles-“

“Thought it would be fun!” Stiles cut Scott off.  “Besides there’s been so much going on, it would be nice to blow off some steam, be regular teenagers for once.”

Scott glared at Stiles. “Dude.”

“What it’s true! Oh hey there’s Lydia’s car.”

A black beetle pulled into the parking lot and Allison and Lydia stepped out.

“Let’s go buddy.” Stiles moved to open his door and get out. “C’mon Elli.”

Scott was out the passengers side and moving across the parking lot before I could even get a leg over the seat. Stiles sighed and helped me out on his side.

“This will be fun.”

“So an ice skating rink?”

Stiles’ face visibly fell. “Boyd said something didn’t he.”

“Stiles there’s a sign.”

“Oh. Right.”

“ _Aaaaaaand_ Boyd might have said something about where he works.” I nicked the keys from Stiles’ hand.

“Hey give those back.”

“Ladies first.” I sang, shoving the key into the lock. I glanced at Stiles over my shoulder, "unless...?"

Scott let out a strangled laugh, which promptly turned into a cough when Stiles whipped around to glare at him.

“Just open the door, Taylor.”

“Ta-da!” I gestured inside, complete with jazz hands.

Stiles put his hands on my shoulders, pushing me inside.

“My turn to say Ta-Da!” Stiles turned on the lights to the rink, mocking me.

“Let’s skate.”

 


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the one where they go ice skating.

Watching Stiles flounder about with Lydia while everyone was putting on their skates was disheartening. But, I wasn’t sure if I was upset for Stiles or me. Scott said he was trying to move on, but maybe he wasn’t ready yet. Watching Stiles be sweet to Lydia, and her not caring at all, was kinda painful. I quickly finished lacing up my skates and started to the ice.

Of course, I had hardly stepped onto the ice for a second and I slipped.

“Woah. You okay there.” Stiles’ hands pressed against my back, stopping me from falling on my ass.

“Yeah I’m fine. It’s been a while since I’ve been on ice.” I brushed Stiles’ off.

I held on to the side for a second to get my balance. Lydia took off to the middle of the ice, doing little jumps and skating in circles.

“You sure?” Stiles’ hand came down on my shoulder.

“Yeah.” I nodded. “Scott might not be though.”

Behind us Scott was struggling like a newborn baby deer to stay upright. Allison was trying to be patient and help him up. She wasn’t doing much. Scott may have super werewolf abilities but the didn’t seem to transcend onto the ice.  While Stiles was distracted at how awful his best friend is at regular teenage activities, I took off. Slowly gaining speed along the side of the rink, swerving to avoid Scott and Allison, and Lydia, and swizzling so I was skating backwards around the rink.

When I skated closer to Stiles, I slowed down and grabbed onto his wrist. With Lydia and I doing perfectly fine on our own, and the whole Scott/Allison almost sort of date thing, he looked a little sad and lonely.

“Woah, okay no. I’m going to fall if you do that.” Stiles protested.

“You’re going to fall if you keep pulling back like that.” I sang. “Oh look, the lovers are abandoning us.”

Stiles’ head jerked to the side, watching Allison pull Scott of the ice.

“They’re probably going make out or cop a feel.” Stiles muttered darkly.

“Awe, Stiles,” I cooed. “Is someone jealous? Did you want to cop a feel with Scotty?”

Stiles rolled his eyes.

“Okay you can let me go now. Before I get rammed into a wall.”

“Okay, Okay. I though you’d be better at this seeing as it was your idea.” I teased, slowing down.

“It’s not like I thought you and Lydia would be fricken’ Olympic skaters!”

“Well I’m not, I don’t know about Lydia though.” I let go of Stiles’ wrist letting him drift along with me. We both skidded to a stop when Lydia started screaming. She was sitting in the middle of the ice on her hands and knees, wiping away at the ice.

“Oh shit.” Stiles slid on his knees in front of Lydia. Scott and Allison reappeared from the photobooth, slipping onto the ice toward Lydia.

“Lydia?” I got on my knees next to Stiles, trying to stop her hands. “Lydia, you’re going to get ice burn.”

She stopped clawing at the ice and looked around at us in confusion.

“I think we need to get Lydia home.” Allison tried to gently lift Lydia to her feet. The poor girl seemed to be on autopilot as Allison helped her off the ice and out of her skates.

I slowly followed Scott and Stiles off the ice.  I put the skates next to me on the benches and struggled to get my boots laced back up.

“Hey,” Stiles sat down next to me, his skates in his hands. “Want me to pick those up for you?”

“If you want. I’m having a little trouble getting these back on.” I laughed, then glanced at Lydia, worried that I shouldn’t have laughed.  Allison was sitting a little ways away from her talking quietly with Scott.

“She’ll be okay. I think.” Stiles sighed, taking my skates and walking away.

By the time Stiles came back, I had both boots on and everyone had gathered up their things. Everyone started walking out of the building, Stiles and I trailing behind while he turned off lights and made sure everything was where it was supposed to be. I waited for him to lock the door while Scott walked Allison and Lydia to her car.

“Sorry we couldn't stay longer.” Stiles leaned his shoulder on the door.

“Not your fault.” I watched Scott kiss Allison. “Besides, it just means we’ll have to come back sometime.”

“W-we… yeah.” Stiles stammered, nodding vigorously. “We’ll have to come back.”

“During regular hours like a normal person though.” I joked.

“But this is so much more fun.” Stiles bated.

“Alright, let’s go.” Scott sighed, leaning against Stiles’ jeep

“How’s Lydia.” Stiles pocketed Boyd’s keys and pulled out his Jeep’s keys.

Scott shrugged, and held the seat for me to get into the back. 

 “So…” I leaned against the seat between the two of them. “Anyone know what’s up with Lydia? Any guesses? With all the screaming I’m guessing, Banshee?” I joked.

Neither of them answered me. Stiles just pushed me in front of him and into his jeep.


	11. Chapter 11

Stiles surprised me the next morning by showing up at my house to give me a ride to school.

“Ready to face the day?”

“Ready as I’ll ever be.”  I sank into the seat. “Do you have lacrosse today?”

“Uh. Probably during free period. I don’t know.” Stiles admitted. “So Scott seems to think that there’s going to be a third beta soon.”

“Third?”

“Yeah. Isaac, Erica, and someone else.”

“How’s he going to find out?”

“I think he said he was going to ask Erica.” Stiles frowned, pulling into the parking lot.

Stiles and I split ways when we got to school and met up again in P.E. where we both listened to Scott complain about not knowing who would be turned next, until I walked off to play volleyball with Allison and Lydia. At lunch I found myself alone at my usual table, Boyd was usually here way before me. Stiles glanced at me several times while he was walking pass.

“Elli! Ell! Ellison.”

“What?” Stiles was hissing my name from a few tables over, when he realized he had my attention he waved me over.

“Where’s Boyd?”

“I don’t know.” I frowned, sitting down next to Stiles.

Scott and Stiles exchanged glances.

“Okay fine. You go to Boyd’s house, I’ll go to the rink. We’ll see if we can find him and stop this.” Scott nodded to Stiles.

“What about me?” I raised an eyebrow.

“Elli.” Stiles started. “Stay here. Maybe he’ll show up. If he does call us. Text us. Whatever.”

I sighed and nodded, there was no way to win this battle.

“But Scott, maybe we should let him. Boy, you know man? You said Derek’s giving them a choice. Right?”

“We can’t.” Scott sighed. Getting up, Stiles and I followed him into the hall.

“You gotta admit, Erica looks pretty good. You know, the word ‘sensational’ comes to mind.” Stiles continued as if Scott hadn’t said anything. My eyes widened and I shared a look with Scott.

“Uh, Stiles?” Scott got Stiles’ attention, he blushed, “yeah, how good do you think she’s going to look with a wolfsbane bullet in her head?”

“Alright, all I’m saying is that maybe this one totally isn’t your responsibility.”

“He’s right, Scott. You can’t save everyone. Even Superman can’t.” Stiles nodded rapidly, pointing at me.

“They all are.” Scott rolled his eyes. “And you know this thing’s going to get out of control. That makes me responsible.”

“You know, I totally don’t follow your logic here, Scotty.” I pointed at him.

Stiles sighed, “all right, I’m with you. and I gotta say this new found heroism is making me very attracted to you.”

I stopped walking, trying not to laugh.

“Shut up.” Scott shook his head and walked off.

Stiles yelled after him, “no, seriously. Do you wanna just try making out for a sec? Just to see how it feels?”

“Oh my god.” I wheezed out. Stiles spun around to face me.

“What. It’s an attractive quality.”

I shook my head and turned to walk to class, “have fun being Batman then. Once again. I'll here.”

I heard Stiles sigh and his feet shuffle. I jumped a little when he wrapped an arm around my waist and kissed my cheek. “For luck.” Stiles whispered, and sprinted off out the door. I bit my lip to stop myself from grinning.


	12. Chapter 12

 

When I got home I laid out on the sofa, clutching my phone. I hadn’t heard form Scott or Stiles for the rest of the day despite having sent them many texts asking if they’d found him yet. I’d pretty much given up on hearing from either of them today.

My phone rang annoyingly loud near my face.

“Hello?”

“Hey, Elli, uh. Can you do me a favor?”

“Depends, Stilinski. I’m not going to say yes to just anything, like streaking or doing the polar bear plunge. I’m going to have to say no to the cinnamon challenge too.”

Stiles laughed, “Yeah that’s not what I’m calling about sadly. Can you pick me up? I called a tow truck for my Jeep but they’re not letting me ride with them? They’re not here yet so.”

“Oi vay. Yeah sure, text me the address.” I sat up and hurried up the stairs.

“Thank you!”

“Yeah well you have some explaining to do so.”

Stiles groaned. “I’ll see you soon.”

When I made it to the address Stiles had texted me, he was instructing the tow guy how to hook up his jeep and the guy looked mega annoyed with him.

“STILINSKI!” I yelled at him, sticking my head out the window of my little green car. Stiles’ head jerked in my direction, he waved his hand at me and turned back to the guy.

I rolled my eyes and got out of the car.

“Stiles really, did you just _wave_ me off?”

The tow guy said something to Stiles that made him turn and stalk away.

“Fucking asshole.”

“STILES!”

“Sorry. Sorry. Sorry. Let’s go.” Stiles sighed.  He started to walk off to my car, but I didn’t move. Instead I started off to the tow guy.

“No, no, no, no.” Stiles ran up behind me and spun me around into his chest. “No. we’re not doing that.” Stiles hugged me tightly to his chest. “Can we please just get into your car.”

“Fine.” My reply was muffled by Stiles’ shirt.

“Hug me back and I’ll let you go.”

“Fiiiiine.” I hugged Stiles back tightly, even swaying us side to side for emphasis.

“Okay. To the car.” Stiles slowly let me go.

In the car Stiles explained what happened, he went to Boyd’s no one answered, he went to leave, Erica hit him over the head with a piece of his own car and knocked him out.

At the mechanics Stiles was once again arguing with the guy, who was now trying to over charge him for parts he didn’t need.

“Hey! Hey? What do you think you’re doing? All I needed was a starter!”

“Yeah, but it looks like your whole exhaust system has to be replaced here.”

“Why do I get the feeling you’re slightly over-estimating the damage?”

“It’s probably going to run you around 1200 parts and labor.”

“Are you kidding, the thing doesn’t even have a catalytic converter. And yes I know what a catalytic converter is.”

“Do you know what a limited slip differential is?”

“No…”

“Yeah, coming on more like 1500.”

I was getting really annoyed with this guy’s attitude. I couldn’t take his smug looks or the way he was eyeing me over Stiles’ shoulder anymore.

I walked over to the guy and grabbed the front of his overalls. “Look here buddy, you’re going to fix only what needs to be fixed and nothing else, and you’re going to give him a fair price. Got it?” I said the last bit in a scarily perky voice and the man cringed.

“Have to get your girlfriend to fight your battles?” he smirked over my shoulder at Stiles.

I swung my arm back and whacked him in the nuts. Then I put on my best cheerleader voice, “Fix it right and fix it fast or you may never feed your nads!”

“Okay, Captain Torrance.” Stiles grabbed my shoulders and pulled me away. “Just fix the damn car, buddy. I’ll be back here, seething with impotent rage.” Stiles move to open the waiting room door. “Oh nice. It’s real sanitary, quality establishment you’re running here. Don’t touch that, E, not something pretty girls should touch or anyone for that matter.” Stiles held open the door for me.

“First I’m a hot girl then I’m a pretty girl.” I mused.

“Who called you hot?” I waved my hand noncommittally. “Fine, whatever. I’m texting Scott. And for someone who’s so tiny you sure do act tough.”  Stiles looked around and scoffed.

“What?”

“Figures” he pointed to a picture of the mechanic in a Beacon Hills Lacrosse uniform.

“Wow, Jackson much?” I scrunched up my eyebrows in distaste. Stiles snorted.

“Uh.”

“Stiles?” I noticed his fingers weren’t moving normally.

“Elli, I’m going to need you to call 911. I… something’s wrong.”

“HELP ME! HELP ME!” I jumped at the sound. Behind me Stiles collapsed on the ground.

“E –ELLI DON’T” Stiles yelled from the floor.

“Stiles. I-”

“D –don’t. Please. And don’t touch the door.”

Something about the situation had me frozen in fear, I couldn’t breathe. Stiles watched me wide eyed, not able to do much to help me or himself. I could hear Stiles in my head telling me do dial 911, but I couldn’t bring myself to move. Somehow I’d managed to block out the crunching and screaming noises from the mechanic, I was completely in my own head.

“Hey, Elli, breathe, breathe with me.” I could hear Stiles’ voice but I couldn’t tell if it was in my head or not. “Elli, please, the cops are on their way. We have to get outside.”

That pulled me out. “Stiles’ you’re okay. I’m so sorry.” Crap, I was crying.

Stiles pulled me out the door, helping me get my cross body bag –well –across my body.

“Ellison, listen to me okay, I’m going to tell them that we got here and he was like that okay? You don’t have to say anything if they ask, just say you had a panic attack and don’t remember much.” Stiles spoke slowly, holding me tight against his chest. He was rubbing my back, trying very desperately to calm me down.

“Is your dad coming?”

“Yeah, probably. It’s okay, okay? Just match your breathing with mine.” Stiles and I stayed like that in the parking lot until the red and blue flashing lights of cop cars surrounded us, me crying silently and trying to control my breathing, and Stiles holding tightly on to me as if he was afraid I’d disappear.

“I told you, we just –we walked in and I saw the jeep on top of the guy, that’s all!” Stiles was telling his dad what happened, or the official story anyway. I was tucked under his arm, trying to regain control of my breathing, I had finally found a stable place when the Sheriff started asking questions and I panicked again. Stiles refused to let go of me. We had moved over to an ambulance that had insisted on checking both of us out, now it was just providing a little shelter from the rain. Mr. Stilinski sat on the back of the ambulance.

“What’s wrong with your hand?” Stiles’ hand twitched against my shoulder as his dad asked that.

“Nothing. Can we just get out of here now?”

“Ellison, sweetheart, are you sure you didn’t see anything?”

“Dad, she’s having a fricken’ panic attack over seeing what I told you we saw. She freaks out at horror movies and those dissection videos in Bio.”

“Look, if there’s something you don’t think you can tell me –”

“Do you think I’m lying?”

“No, of course not, I’m just worried about you two. Now if you saw someone do this, if you’re afraid that maybe they’re gonna come back and make sure you don’t say anything about it –”

“I didn’t see anything. At all. Can we go now? Please?”

“Sure but not in your jeep. We’re going to have to impound it. Sorry, kid. Evidence.”

“It’s fine. Elli drove me here.”

“I don’t think she’s in any state to drive, Stiles.”

“I’ll drive her home. Then call Scott to pick me up from her house.”

“Fine. I’ll see you at home.”

“All right, well, at least make sure they wash the jeep, kay?”

The sheriff walked away, back to the crime scene.

“Elli, can you give me your keys?”

I blinked. “You don’t need them.”

“Yes I do. To drive your car.” Stiles spoke slowly.

“No, Stiles, it’s keyless.”

“Oh. Right. Okay. Let’s get out of here.”

I’m not quite sure how we got home from there, or how Stiles managed to detach me from him, or how long it took for Scott to show up at my house, or when he appeared in my living room. To be honest most of it, the from the crime scene to the part where I was on my sofa wrapped in a blanket watching Batman, I can’t remember the how’s of getting from point a to point b.

“You okay?” I heard Scott’s voice somewhere behind me.

“Yeah. You were right. It’s not like you. I mean, it’s eyes were almost like, reptilian, but there something about them.”

“What do you mean?” I could feel Scott’s eyes on the back of my head.

“You know when you see, like, a friend in a Halloween mask, but all you can really see are their eyes and you feel like you know ‘em but you can’t figure out who it is?

“Are you saying you know who it is?”

“No, but I think it knew me, I think it knew me.”

“Is she okay?” Scott’s voice dropped.

“She had a panic attack. I didn’t know she gets those.”

“Maybe it was a first time thing?”

“No. I could tell.  It was like when I get them sometimes, and I, like, know I’m having one but I can’t stop it even though I’m trying.” Stiles explained, “she was trying to stop it, the way she was breathing and everything, but she couldn’t.” He paused, "There was nothing she could do to help either way and…I didn’t want her getting hurt.”

“Are you ready for me to bring you home? Because I have to get the car back to my mom, no rush, I’m sure she’d understand if I explained about Ellison.”

Stiles sighed. “Yeah, just give me a second.”

Stiles crouched down in front of me.

“Hey.” I whispered.

“Hey. Are you okay? Are you going to be okay?” Stiles grabbed my hands and held them between us, rubbing his thumb across the backs of my hand.

“Yeah. I think so. Who put on Batman?”

“Me, uh. It kind of calmed you down.”

“I’m sorry.” I would have ran a hand over my face if Stiles hadn’t been holding both of them.

“Don’t be.” Stiles sighed. “Look, I’m going home okay, but I’ll call you as soon as I can and text you when I get home so you know okay?”

I nodded. “Be careful. You too Scott.” Half glancing over my shoulder at him. Stiles stood.

“Everything will be fine, Ell, I’ll take care of him.” Scott tried to joke.

“I’ll see y’all tomorrow.”

Stiles bent down and kissed my cheek, his face went red. “G’night, Elli.”

“Night.”

I rubbed my tired eyes and felt my wet cheeks. Funny - I didn't even know I had been crying.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "I'm strong and I'm loud, I'm gonna make you proud, I'm T-T-T-Torrance, Your captain Torrance." ;)  
> (Because who doesn't love a Bring It On reference)


	13. Chapter 13

Walking down the hallway the next morning, I spotted Lydia sitting in the guidance lobby. I found myself doing a double take, she was sitting there talking to herself and glaring at the empty chair next to her and wearing gloves. Eventually she huffed and flounced into the guidance office. What’s going on with Lydia?

By first period I had been informed by Stiles, Scott, and later Allison, that Scott and Allison weren’t allowed to see each other in school and that the creepy old guy from the other day was our new principal and Allison’s scary grandpa. Not to mention he was twice as vindictive as some guy named Peter was and a lot more trigger happy than Allison’s Aunt Kate. I nodded like I understood when Scott and Allison had both explained this to me (Scott, Re: Aunt Kate and Peter, Allison Re: he’s her grandpa and a little restrictive), but when Stiles mentioned all those things again I didn’t even bother trying to hide my confusion about who Kate and Peter were and why they were vindictive and trigger happy.

Stiles sighed, “I forget you don’t know this stuff, okay, Kate is Allison’s aunt right?” Stiles kept his voice low, walking closer to me to avoid being overheard by people going to class.

I nodded, “I got that much.”

“Right well, she’s the one who set the Hale house on fire, Derek’s a Hale, Peter’s his uncle. He was the alpha and he bit Scott, but Derek killed him so he’s the alpha now.”

“Which is why he’s been making a pack?”

“Right! So basically, Kate went crazy and killed a whole bunch of people in burning the Hale house, and when she came back to kill Peter, the alpha but she didn’t know it was Peter at the time, anyway she almost killed Scott AND Derek multiple times, shooting them. Once she shot Derek with a wolfsbane bullet and I almost had to amputate his arm, thank god I didn’t have to. Then Peter killed her. And then the whole school heard about her killing all those people years back and being charged with the Hale fire and they put it as Allison would be crazy too. Peter on the other hand was drunk with power and he was always after revenge for Kate killing everyone in his family. Got it?” We stopped near the door of my math class.

“I think so. So Kate basically just wanted to fill everyone with bullets and Peter just wanted to kill Kate for killing his family?”

Stiles suddenly grabbed me, hugging me tight. “Yes! I’m so glad you’re smart, Scott would have just stared at me.”

“Okay, I have math, I’ll see you at lunch.”

Stiles grinned and gave me two thumbs up. “See ya, Taylor!”

~-~

At lunch I found myself sitting outside, Scott and Stiles were wondering around inside doing who knows what.

“Hey, Ellison?” I looked up. Allison stood there a little awkwardly balancing a tray on her arm. “Is it okay if I sit with you?”

“Yeah sure.” I cleared off a few open books so she had more space.

“Thanks, it’s just Lydia’s being, well, Lydia and Jackson’s being a little weird. I’d rather not be in the middle of that.”

“No, it’s fine. I don’t mind. I don’t know where Scott and Stiles are though. I was supposed to meet them for lunch.”

Allison got out a few of her own books and grabbed a pen. “Well Stiles is running around. Scott and I can’t exactly be seen together.”

“But you choose to associate with Stiles still?” I laughed.

Allison laughed and shook her head. “I know, but it’s less suspicious than Scott. And we can’t text each other. My parents are monitoring my texts and emails.”

“Oh that blows. I’m kind of glad my parents never really cared. But then again I’m usually pretty open about who I’m talking to.” Allison laughed. “It throws off the parent and/or guardian for when you’re actually lying.”

Stiles burst out the school doors and looked around wildly before spotting me and Allison, running over and collapsing on the bench next to me.

“Hey, E. Okay,” He panted, “Does your grandfather have a bestiary?”

“I think you mean –“

“No, I mean bestiary. And the two of you, I don’t want to know what’s going on in your heads?”

“Me?”

“No. Allison and Scott.” Stiles patted my shoulder.

“Okay, um, can you describe this thing?” I looked at Allison as if she was crazy, as soon as the words came out of her mouth, does no one but me and Stiles read?

“Uh, it’s probably like a book? Old, worn.” Stiles glanced at me for confirmation. I nodded.

“Like, bound in leather?”

Stiles took off running back into the school.

“You really don’t know what a bestiary is?”

“No, not really.”

“It’s a book, hunters used to them to keep track of the animals that they come across. It was kind of an encyclopedia of animals.”

Allison hummed.

“You know Stiles could just text me what Scott wants to tell you, or just have Scott text me and you read it and text him back? But I have a feeling the bestiary is all Stiles.”

She laughed. “Yeah given what Stiles said I think Scott was clueless too.”

“He’s so dumb, that boy. He’s lucky he has the puppy face going for him.”

Stiles came running back over to us, breathing hard. He doubled over on the bench.

“Where. Does. He. Keep. It?” Stiles gasped.

“Um, probably in his office.”

Before I could get a word in, Stiles took off running.

“Honestly I don’t know how he got on the lacrosse team if he can’t run for long periods of time, good thing he’s not in soccer.”

Allison snorted. “You could probably text him you know.”

“Yeah, but I’m waiting for him to figure it out.”

“So, when are you going to tell him you like him?”

“WHAT?!” I screeched. “No, no, no, no. we’re just friends.”

Allison smirked. “mhmm.”

Stiles ran over panting, he used Scott’s old inhaler and collapsed onto the bench.

“You know, drug dealers have been using disposable cell phones pretty successfully for years.” Stiles rested his forehead on my shoulder.

“My parents check every call, email, and text message I send, trust me, they’d find it.” Allison didn’t miss the opportunity to smirk at me.

Stiles shifted to face her. “All right, can you get the book?”

“Not without his keys.” She shrugged.

Stiles took off again. I rolled my eyes.

“Before he comes back and asks, how exactly do you plan on getting those keys?”

“I don’t know, I can try and sneak them off of him, maybe at the lacrosse game tonight? They’re usually on him.”

I nodded and took out my phone, I found Stiles’ text stream at the top of the messages in my iphone and typed out _‘Ally A. says she’ll get the keys off him at the lax game tonight. ;)’_

A few seconds later my phone buzzed. ‘ _I hate you. You could have texted me earlier.’_

_‘not my fault you didn’t think of it or stay in one place long enough for me to.’_

_‘You suck Taylor.’_

_'nope, that’s you stilinski._ ’

“He’s mad that I didn’t text him sooner.” I snorted. Allison laughed.

“Neither of us seem to like very smart boys.”

I rolled my eyes. “Scott’s just dumb. Both of those two lack common sense skills. And that is NOT an admission to anything.” I pointed a finger at Allison before her smile could get any bigger.

“So I’ll see you at the game?”

“Yeah.” I sighed, “I have to make sure those two dumb-asses don’t do anything too stupid.”

“Good luck with that.”


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> anyone else nervous for the s5b finale tonight?

I had never been more anxious at the end of school before, with the whole heist to get Gerard’s keys and the bestiary, after school seemed more stressful than actual school.

“Alright, class you’re free to go!” Mr. Reed shouted over the bell. “Don’t forget tonight’s readings!”

Walking into the hall, I started going over a mental checklist of things I’d need to do between now and the game. Stiles came barreling toward me, grabbing my arm and turning be back the way I had come from.

“Hey.” Stiles grinned.

“Yes?”

“Are you coming to the game tonight?”

“Duh, I have to make sure you and Scott survive.”

“Great. But you do know I’m not playing? I never play. I sit bench.”

I shrugged. “Maybe someone will break a leg and they’ll put you in?”

Stiles shook his head, “besides I have to break –I mean I have to get that thing during the game. While everyone’s distracted.”

I frowned. “Right, I forgot about that.”

“Yeah.” Stiles pressed his lips together. “But you’ll be there right?”

“I said yes. I’m about to go home and get shit done so I can come back here tonight.” I lightly tapped the side of Stiles’ head.

“Right, right. Sorry.” Stiles bobbed his head. “I’ll, uh, walk you to your car? If that’s okay?”

“C’mon Stilinski.” I nodded my head toward the doors.

Stiles leaned against my door, chewing on his lip.

“Stiles?”

“What? Yeah?”

“Be careful tonight. Okay.” He nodded. “I’ll see you before the game? Just to check in?”

“Yeah, yeah. Totally.” Stiles nodded

At home I laid out clothes for tonight, jelly sandals that my feet would probably freeze in, but they handled wet grass really well, fleece leggings, cuffed jean shorts, an maroon underarmour top, a sparkly sequin top to go over it, and my black underarmour jacket with thumb holes. Before I knew it, I had to be dressed and get back to the school for the game.

“Ellison!”

I whipped around, Stiles came jogging up to me in the most ridiculous tracksuit.

“Going for a run, Potter?”

“What?” Stiles blinked. “I told you I’m not playing. Coach won’t even notice I’m not in gear. It’s not like I can run around the school in my pads.”

“Tracksuit though?”

“It made sense at the time! And the whole team has them.” Stiles huffed.

“Like the time you wore a hat?”

“I can wear hats!”

“But you don’t.”

“Okay, look, you’re going to sit down there, hopefully near Allison so you can keep an eye on Gerard too.”

“Aye, aye, captain.”

“Your sarcasm is ridiculously unhelpful right now.”

“Alright, look just be careful okay, and call me if you need help. I’m pretty stealthy.” I winked. Stiles laughed.

“Yeah okay, I’ll call Batwoman if Batman needs help.”

“I thought we talked about this, BlueBird or HawkFire.”

Stiles rolled his eyes. “Go take a seat.”

“Fine, fine.”

“What no ‘be careful’?” Stiles called after me.

“I already said that to you, moron.”

I sat as close as I could to the side of the bleachers, hoping that I was downwind. Allison was guiding her grandpa over to where I was, but he was guiding her to the other side, then she pointed in my direction and the two made their way to my end.

“Ell!” Allison grinned, taking a seat on the row behind me.

“Hey, Allison. Cold tonight.”

“Yeah it is. Hopefully it doesn’t get too much colder.” She eyed my shoes. I nodded.

“Oh Yeah, Grandpa this is Ellison, Ell this is my grandpa, Gerard.”

“Ah yes, we’ve met. You have stellar academics.”

“Thank you, sir. I’d say I try, but it mostly comes naturally to me. As long as I pay attention of course.”

“That’s a skill I think most kids wish they had, huh Allison?”

“Oh yeah.” Allison nodded. Conversation lulled and I turned my attention to the game.

“Ellison!” I turned, Sheriff Stilinski sat in front of me. “Have you seen my son?”

“Uh, yes sir, but I don’t know where he went.”

Mr. Stilinski sighed. “Sounds about right.”

Behind me Allison muttered something about her jacket being too thin, which did the trick for Gerard handing over his jacket. Something gently tapped my calf twice. I glanced to the side as if I saw something and caught a blur of maroon. I looked back at Allison. She nodded.

“Brutal game, huh Allison? I didn’t expect that big guy. He looks like a line backer.”

“Oh yeah. I’m not even sure that’s legal.”

My eyes shifted to Melissa, and that kid named Matt who was taking pictures. Ms. Melissa looked so uncomfortable.

“WHERE’S STILINSKI? WHERE’S STILINSKI?!” Coach shouted. _Craaaaap_. Boyd stood up and coach called him down.

“This isn’t good.”

 _'STILES. THEY WANTED YOU ON THE FIELD YOU COULD HAVE PLAYED!!!!_ ’

I watched as Scott broke his leg, or it sounded like he did. Then Gerard whisked him away. Really not good. My leg bounced. Sheriff Stilinski glanced at me.

“Still no word?”

"No but I texted him that he missed a shot to play. He hasn’t texted me back.” I chewed on my thumb nail.

“If I know my dumbass son, he’s fine. It’s when you hear from him that there’s trouble.” Mr. Stilinski joked.

I giggled. “Yeah I know.”

“You know what, you should come for dinner one night. I’ll talk to Stiles, we’ll pick a date when you’re aunt’s out of town, you have to be tired of frozen foods. I know we usually eat on the run, but I can cook something for once, I’ll be nice.”

“I’d love to Mr. Stilinski. But I don’t want to impose if Stiles doesn’t want me there or something.”

“I doubt that very much.” He patted my knee. “Drive safe, kid.”

“You too!”

I sat there for a couple of seconds watching Mr. Stilinski walk to his cruiser. My phone buzzed in my hand.

“Hello?”

“Oh thank god. E. I need you to help. I’m in the pool room. It’s kind of an emergency.”

“I’ll be right there.”

 


	15. Chapter 15

I ran through the school toward the pool, quickly French braiding my hair as I ran. “Okay, okay, think.” I muttered to myself, shedding off my jacket and purse and detaching the mace from the keys., “I can’t bring these in there, what use would a wet set of keys and phone be anyway.” When I reached the door, I stashed my things behind a towel cart and prayed that no one would steal them. I had to try and psych myself up.  “Okay deep breaths, you can do this. Hero mode, activate.”

“Who’s that? Who did you call?! You were supposed to be calling SCOTT!”

“Okay look I don’t know who you are, I have mace?” I shrugged, glancing around for Stiles. I located him in the pool, around the 8 foot mark, holding up some dude who looked like a human grumpy cat in leather.

“She can’t help!” he hissed

“Yes she can. Look Scott wasn’t answering his phone.” Stiles’ almost disappeared under the water after that.

“Okay uh, Stiles, get him on his back. As long as he’s breathing he should be able to hold himself up more or less.” My eyes caught the lizard thing from the mechanics crawling up the wall. “Oh. Oh wow. Okay.”

It seemed to be distracted by the light from the skylight reflecting off my shirt and onto the wall. “Yeah okay, Shiny shirt not as good of an idea anymore.”

“What made you wear that anyway?!” Stiles panicked.

“Uh. A combination of Lydia rubbing off on me and hoping it was distract Gerard at some point??”

“Yeah well it’s distracting something all right, but not Gerard.”

“Keep him on his back Stiles!” my eyes darted around after the lizard, but I could hear the dude with Stiles was having trouble. “Oh shit, oh shit.” The thing was starting to move after me.

“RUN!”

I stumbled backward and tripped over a rope, falling directly into the pool.

“ELL!” I could hear Stiles’ muffled yelling through the water. Instead of fighting my way to the surface, I let myself touch the bottom before pushing up to the top.

“Oh God, Ell DON’T do that again!”

“Geeze Stilinski, it’s not like I can’t swim.”

“Shut UP! Both of you.” The guy hissed.

“Right. Elli, Derek, Derek, Ellison.”

“Okay, so remember when I said I could swim? I meant leisurely, I can’t keep this up for too long.”

“I can’t stay up any longer, I need something to hold onto.” Stiles was still holding up Derek’s head, that kid was like human lead. He kept sinking.

“Diving boards?”

Stiles nodded and started swimming that way. I pushed on Derek’s feet.  Things weren’t looking too great.

Scott, the human version of superman, pulled Stiles, Derek, and I out of the water.

“Oh thank god.” I gasped.

Stiles was slumped against the wall, pretty out of it, while Scott fought off the lizard thing.

~*~

“So the bestiary was on a USB this whole time?” I frowned and adjusted my purse to wrap my arms around myself as if it would help the cold wind not cut so much.

Stiles shuffled over and wrapped his arms around my shoulders blocking some of the wind.

“How are we supposed to figure out what this thing is?”

“It’s called a kanima.” Grumpy spoke. I jumped making Stiles laugh.

“You knew the whole time.” He pointed an accusing finger at Derek.

“No, Only when it was confused by it’s own reflection.”

“It doesn’t know what it is.” Scott realized.

“Or who.”

“What else do you know?”

“Just stories, rumors.”

“A kanima is a South American myth, a jaguar shaped spirit that seeks and kills murderers.” I remembered that myth. My mom used to teach it. I frowned. “Except this one isn’t a jaguar. It’s a lizard. That’s why I couldn’t find anything.”

Derek eyed me.

Scott broke the silence. “But it’s like us?”

“A shape shifter, yes, but it’s –it’s not right. It’s like –”

“An abomination.” Stiles frowned.

I tuned out Scott and Derek’s conversation about trusting people.

“Hey. Want me to walk you to your car?” Stiles had apparently tuned out the conversation too.

“Yeah okay.” I nodded, Stiles nodded too and unwrapped his arms from my shoulder, I felt instantly colder.

“You should probably head home too. Wet clothes plus cold air equals flu, or worse, pneumonia.”

“I’ll be fine.” Stiles reassured me. “However, if you get sick, I have hook ups.”

“Scott’s mom is your drug dealer?”

“Totally.” Stiles laughed.

I tossed my purse and phone into the passengers seat, grabbing a beach towel from the backseat.

“I’ve never been more glad for these ugly shoes in my life. I don’t have to drive home barefoot or with soggy socks.”

Stiles made a face and looked down at his own feet. “Don’t remind me."

“By the way, you dad wants me to come over for dinner one day. I just thought you should have a heads up.”

Stiles did a double take. “Really?”

“Yep.” I nodded. “Okay, so as much as I’d love to sit here and chat, I’m cold and wet and I kind of want to go to bed. So I’ll see you tomorrow, Stilinski.”

Stiles grinned, “Yeah I’ll see you tomorrow, Taylor.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> most of these chapters end in 'good night's and i'm not even sorry about it.


	16. Chapter 16

The drive to school took way longer than it should have, between waking up late and the police jam on my usual route to school I had nearly no time to let my hair out of the braid I slept in and straighten it and the only time I had for make up was mascara and eyeliner. So I let my hair down as I drove and hoped it didn’t look too horrible, and of course, Scott and Stiles were waiting for me in the parking lot when I finally made it to school.

“Dude, I just talked to my dad, who just talked to Jackson, and I’ve got really terrible, horrible, very, very bad news.” Stiles was talking fast at Scott when I walked up.

“I think I already know.” Scott frowned.

“All right, I only found on thing online called a kanima. It’s a werejaguar from South America that only goes after murderers.”

“That thing was not a jaguar.”

“Yeah and I’m not exactly a murderer.”

“Uh, boys.” I interrupted, both jumped and spun to face me, jaws dropping open, “Yeah that’s not cute.” I shook my head, pushing up both their jaws. “Sorry to rain on this leeetle parade, but I told you the other night that a kanima was a South American myth and they only go after murderers. So good job not listening to me.”

“I did listen!” Stiles threw up his hands. “I was just double checking, it’s not like Scott’s going to Google it!”

“Yeah, but you did see it kill somebody, which is probably why it tried to kill you, and it’s still trying to kill you, and it probably won’t stop until you’re dead.”

“Oh real positive outlook there Scotty.”

“You know, sometimes I really begin to question this ‘friendship’.” Stiles rolled his eyes at Scott’s back. “C’mon, E, we’ve got Econ to get to… you uh, you look nice by the way.”

“Liar, but thanks.” I linked my arm through Stiles’ and pulled him to Econ.

“You know you make the rest of us common people look bad.” Stiles nodded.

I snorted and took my seat in front of him. “Why because I’m smarter?”

Stiles went to retort, but was cut off my Jackson, “Hey testicle left and right, what the hell is a kanima?”

I glanced wide eyed to my left at Scott. Coach started talking before Scott or Stiles could react.

“All right, listen up! A quick warning before we begin our review, some of you, like McCall, might want to start their own study groups, because tomorrow’s midterm is so profoundly difficult –I’m not even too sure I could pass it. Okay, I need a volunteer at the board to answer the first question. Who’s got it, huh? Come on, let’s go, buddy.” Coach pointed out a lacrosse kid on the other end of the room.

Jackson took the opportunity to continue.

“Paralyzed form the neck down. Do you have any idea what that feels like?”

“I’m familiar with the sensation.” Stiles muttered bitterly. I sucked a breath, trying to forget.

“Wait –why would Derek test you? Why would he think that it’s you?”

“How should I know?” Jackson seethed.

“Wait, do they think it’s Lydia?” I could hear Stiles’ desk squeak as he turned around. I tried to resist turning around as well.

“I don’t know, all I heard was her name and something about chemistry.”

“Jackson! Do you have something you want to share with the rest of the class?” those boys really need to learn how to whisper.

“Um –just an undying admiration for my –my coach.”

“Kiss ass” I whispered. Scott snorted.

“That’s really kind of you. Now shut up! Shut it! Anybody else?” When no one said anything Coach returned to his review, calling Lydia up to the board.

“How do we know it’s not her?” I glanced at Scott, he was eyeing Lydia at the board.

“How do we know it’s not her?” I glanced at Scott, he was eyeing Lydia at the board.

“Because I looked into the eyes of that thing, okay?” geeze Stiles, stop reminding me. “And what I saw was pure evil. And when I look into Lydia’s eyes, I only see 50% evil, all right maybe 60, you know, but no more than 40 on a good day.” I stopped myself from snorting at that. Lydia may come off a little strong, but in no way was she evil, just self assured, blunt, and with a shell of impenetratable armor. I had 3 classes with her. Once you got into her sanctum you got a slightly more vulnerable Lydia and understood that most of what she said came from a good, but slightly misplaced, place.

“Stiles that’s not a very good argument.”

“I’m aware of that, but I swear it’s not her. It can’t be, all right? Lydia’s fine.”

“Lydia’s not fine.” I turned slightly to catch Stiles’ eye.

“What?” Stiles squinted. I nodded my head to the board.

“Okay then,” Coach clapped his hands, “anybody else what to try answering? This time in English?”

“What is that Greek?”

“No, actually I think it’s English.”

Lydia had written ‘Someone Help Me’ backwards, several dozen times across the board.

I tilted my head back.

“This might be the only time I’m seriously hating that I’m not in your Chem class.”

I had to listen to Scott and Stiles theorize the whole way from Econ to Chem, I stopped outside of Ms. Chetty’s class. “Seriously. This blows.”

“Yeah the one time you complain about already taking a class.”

“Don’t worry. We’ll tell you what happened.” Scott reassured. Scott and Stiles exchanged a glance and walked into Harris’ class.

I had to push that out of my head and attempt to focus for the next 45 minutes. By the end of the class, Ms. Chetty was watching me curiously and I was ready to bolt out the door.

“Okay class, you’re free to go. Don’t forget your assignments are due next class.”

I grabbed my bag and walked as briskly as possible out of the classroom. No sooner had I stepped foot out of the class than a hand grabbed my arm pulling me backwards off to the side and into a spare room.

“Scott. Jesus.” I hit his chest. “Hey Allison.” My eyes darted around looking for Stiles.

“Stiles followed Lydia. He’s making sure Isaac and Erica don’t do anything.”

My eyes went wide. “They tried to poison her with kanima venom.” Allison added.

“What? Did they want her to drop down paralyzed in the middle of Chem? Are they idiots?” I frowned.

“Yeah well, it didn’t work.”

“Maybe she’s immune?” I shrugged. Scott eyed me. “What? It’s possible. Some people are immune to poison ivy, why should supernatural be any different. Plus some animals are immune to some snake venom.  I mean it’s kind of like how some people are super allergic to peanuts but most aren’t. Imagine if everyone was allergic and only some people weren’t.”

Scott sighed. “Maybe. But I don’t think you’d be able to convince Derek that.”

“Derek’s outside waiting for Lydia.” Allison added.

“To kill her? Isn’t that a bit extreme?”

“If he thinks she’s the kanima, then yes, especially after what happened at the pool.”

“It’s not her.” Stiles jogged into the room behind Scott.

“Stiles, she didn’t pass the test, man. Nothing happened.”

I shrugged, “better for Harris that nothing did, can you imagine?”

“No, it can’t be her.” Stiles insisted.

“It doesn’t matter because Derek thinks it’s her. So either we can convince him that he’s wrong or we’ve got to figure out a way to protect her.” Allison shrugged.

“Well I really don’t think he’s going to do anything here, not at school.”

“You mean not with witnesses.” I interjected.

Allison’s eyebrows drew together. “What about after school? What if we can prove that Derek’s wrong?”

“By 3 o’clock?”

“There could be something in the bestiary.” She shrugged.

“Oh, you mean the 900 page book written in archaic Latin that none of us can read? Good luck with that. Unless you can read it, E? Anymore hidden talents?”

I shook my head. “Sorry, I’m hardly passing French at times.”

Stiles rolled his eyes at that, knowing that the B I had was hardly failing.

“Actually, I think I know someone who might be able to translate it.

“Uh I can talk to Derek, maybe convince him to give us a chance to prove that it’s not her, but if anything happens, you guys let me handle it okay?”

“What does that mean?”

“That you can’t heal like I do, I don’t want you getting hurt.”  I rolled my eyes but let Allison and Scott have their moment. Instead I focused on Stiles curiously riffling through Allison’s bag of weapons and holding her crossbow.

"Stiles." I tried to quietly warn him to put it down. He made a face at me and continued to inspect the weapon.

“I just don’t want you to get hurt. Seriously, if anything goes wrong you call me okay? I don’t care if your dad finds out, call, text, scream, yell, whatever! I’ll hear you and find you as fast as I can. We have until 3:00.”

Stiles accidentally pulled the trigger on the crossbow sending an arrow flying at Scott’s face. He quickly caught it and glared at Stiles.

“Ah! Sorry, sorry, sensitive trigger on that.” His face went red as he set it down. Allison quickly grabbed her things and headed out to translate the pages. Scott eyed Stiles, who was hanging his head.

“Okay I’m going find Boyd.” He pointed at me and Stiles, “You two, act normal.”

“Hey I’m always normal. Relatively speaking.” I smirked.

“Yeah it wasn’t you I was worried about.”

“Gee thanks Scotty.” Stiles rolled his eyes. Scott left the room.

“So what now?”

“We can make out? That’s normal.” Stiles’ face was still a little red.

I rolled my eyes at him, unable to stop myself from smiling. “Yeah how about we work on making Lydia think things are normal while keeping her safe?”

“That is a good idea also.” Stiles nodded vigorously.


	17. Chapter 17

“If we’re doing a study group, why don’t we just stay in the library?”

“Because we’re meeting up with somebody else.” Stiles side eyed me. I nodded rapidly for Lydia’s benefit.

“Hmm, well, why don’t they just meet us in the library?” Lydia was asking too many questions. Did these boys really thing this was a good idea? Lydia’s not going to just follow blindly, which I tried to tell them, but it was our best option.

“Oh, that would’ve been a great idea. Too late.” Stiles made a none too apologetic face.

“Okay, hold on –”

“Lydia, shut up and walk!” Jackson pushed. I rolled my eyes. From the minimal contact I’ve had with Jackson, I don’t know if I could deal with him often and I don’t know how anyone else could.

Lydia was huffy the whole car ride, making backhanded comments at anyone who might have been listening, and asking questions that everyone pretended not to hear.

“If we’re studying at Scott’s house, then where’s Scott?”

“Good question Lydia.” I raised my eyebrows at the boys.

“Meeting us here. I think. I hope.” Stiles glared at me.

Allison hurried through the door after us.

“Thanks.” She muttered to Jackson.

Stiles pushed a chair up against the door and locked it. Yeah that’s not subtle. Apparently no one else thought it was subtle either.

“Uh, there’s been a few break-ins around the neighborhood … and a murder. Yeah, it was bad.” Stiles hurried to explain.

Jackson broke in before Lydia could question it more. “Lydia! Follow me, I need to talk to you for a minute.”

“Seriously? What’s going on with everyone?” Lydia threw up her hands in frustration.

Lydia and Jackson walked off into a room upstairs. Allison whipped out her phone.

“So I honestly don’t know what to do right now.” I shrugged. “I’m going to sit down right over there and just wait?”

Stiles nodded, alternating between watching Allison on the phone and glancing out the window. I pushed my glasses up my nose and squinted to see over Stiles’ shoulder. I guess Derek was here. And I hoped this human barricade doesn’t end like it did in _Les Misérables_.

Allison was pacing, “I think –I think I have to call my dad.” She chewed on her lip.

“No, but if he finds you here –you and Scott…”

“I know, but what are we supposed to do? They’re not here to scare us, okay? They’re here to kill Lydia.”

“I don’t know about you Stiles, but I’d rather not have a dead Lydia on our hands. There’s something going on with her, but it isn’t what Derek thinks, I don’t know what it is, but I can feel that it’s not evil. It’s not the kanima.”

“I got an idea.” Stiles beamed. “Just shoot one of ‘em.”

“Are you serious?” Allison and I blurted in unison.

“We told Scott we could protect ourselves, so let’s do it.” Stiles glanced at me and Allison’s dubious expressions. “Or at least give it a shot, right?”

Allison sighed, “which one?”

“Uh, Derek, yeah shoot him, preferably in the head.”

“Shouldn’t we be trying NOT to kill anyone?”  I asked.

“If Scott was able to catch an arrow, Derek definitely can.” Allison shook her head at Stiles.

“Okay, uh, just shoot one of the other three then.”

“You mean two.”

“Uh-oh.” I mumbled.

“No, I mean three.” Stiles talked over me. “Where the hell is Isaac?”

“What was that?” Lydia came barreling down the stairs. “What’s happening?”

Allison glanced at Lydia, a got up quickly and grabbed Lydia by the arm

"Get back, someone’s trying to break in, okay? Go. Lydia, go! Jackson?”

I grabbed Lydia's arm and pulled her up the stairs with Allison. Allison let go and pushed Lydia and me into one of the bedrooms. I tugged Lydia away from the door and locked it.

Lydia fought my grip and started dialing on her phone. “Hi, I –I need the police.”

C’mon Lydia, please.” I pulled her with me into the bathroom, but she pulled away from me and made her way out of the house completely.

“Would someone please tell me what the hell is going on?”

I hurried after her, nearly tripping over the steps and into Stiles.

“It’s Jackson.” Scott up at us. In the distance we could all hear sirens.

Allison quickly turned to Lydia. “I need you to promise that you wont’ say anything about what just happened.”

“I’ll promise not to say anything about what just happened if you tell me what the hell just happened.” Well it’s not like it wasn’t a fair trade.

“It’s… it’s kind of complicated.” Allison scrunched up her face.

I groaned, this was not a conversation I wanted to have. Stiles and Scott had left ages ago, so I called Stiles.

“Come pick me up! I’m not okay with being left on Lydia duty.” I hissed into the phone.

“Fine! Fine! Where are you?”

“I’m about to get in my car. Are you closer to mine or Scotts? Or yours? I can drive one of those places, I’m not leaving my car just anywhere.”

“Go to yours, I’m right by there.”

Stiles was waiting on the street when I pulled up. I hurried out of my car, locking it over my shoulder and running to Stiles’ jeep.

“Okay, Scott, what do we do now?”

“ _Holy cra-”_

“What? Did you see where he went?” I grabbed Stiles’ phone from his hand.

“ _I lost him_.” Scott said sadly.

“What? You couldn’t catch his scent?” Stiles glanced at his phone, turning down another street.

“ _I don’t think he has one_.”

Stiles pulled over once again. Scott appeared and opened the passenger door. I groaned.

“Backseat?”

“Backseat.” Scott nodded.

“All right. Any clue where he’s going?” Stiles glanced at his friend, starting down the road again.

“To kill someone.”

“Ah that explains the claws, the fangs, and all that, good. Makes perfect sense now.” Stiles muttered sarcastically. Scott rolled his eyes. “What? Scott, come on. I’m 147 lbs of pale skin and fragile bone okay? Sarcasm is my only defense.” I opened my mouth. Stiles caught my eye in the rear view mirror. “Don’t you dare, E.”

“Just help me find it.”

“Not ‘it’. Jackson.” I tapped Scott’s head.

“Yeah, I know. I know.”

“All right. But does he know that? Did anybody else see him back at your house?” Stiles glanced at me then at Scott.

“I mean, I don’t think so, but he already passed Derek’s test anyway.”

“Yeah but that’s the thing how did he pass the test?”

“I don’t know.”

“Because he wasn’t in the form of the kanima.” I  leaned forward to remind them I was here.

“Maybe it’s like an either–or thing.” Stiles nodded. “I mean, Derek said that a snake can’t be poisoned by its own venom, right? When’s the kanima not the kanima?”

“When it’s Jackson.” Scott admitted.

“See, you guys should listen to me more often.” I smirked. Scott rolled his eyes, but he was smiling anyway.

“Uh, dude. See that?” Stiles pointed somewhere in the dark.  I couldn’t quite make it out.

“He’s inside.”

“What’s he gonna do in there?”

“Go dancing, what do you think, Stiles.” I whacked the back of his head. Stiles whined.

“I know who he’s after.” Scott’s eyes went wide.

“What? How? HOW? Did you smell something?” Stiles rattled. I pinched the bridge of my nose.

“Armani.”

Was that supposed to mean something?

Scott climbed out of the car as soon as Stiles managed to park it. Stiles on the other hand waited and helped me out from the backseat. We walked with Scott up to the back of the building.

“Aw, come on, All right, maybe there’s like, a, uh, like a window we could climb through.” I made a face. “Or some kind of –handle that we could rip off with supernatural strength.” Stiles made a face this time, “how’d I not think of that one? Not a word, E”

I mimed zipping my lips.

Stiles grabbed my hand, following Scott as he weaved in and out of people. When we stopped, Stiles somewhat hesitantly let go of my hand.

“Dude, everyone in here is a dude. I think we’re in a gay club.”

I snorted. “Killer observation, Sherlock.”

“Man nothing gets past those keen werewolf senses, huh, Scott?”

Scott and I turned to Stiles, he was being stroked by a half a dozen drag queens. I bit my lip to stop myself from laughing and averted my eyes. Scott and Stiles tried to buy booze, I declined anything, still looking around.

“Hey! Guys, I spy with my little eye, Danny!”

“Wha-?” Stiles jerked away from the bar and followed my gaze.

“And I found Jackson.” Scott frowned. “You two, get Danny.”

“What’re you going to do?” Scott had already started off. “Works for me.”

Stiles grabbed my hand again, lacing our fingers together.

“DANNY! Danny! Hey Danny,” Stiles yelled.

I whacked his arm, “you’re in a club, smartie, he’s not going to hear you.”

“Jackson! No! Don’t!”

I could hardly keep track of all four people. Stiles and Danny were one thing, but Scott and Jackson were another.  Chaos broke out as Jackson started to attack people, Stiles gripped my hand tighter pulling me out of the club quickly.

"What are we supposed to do now?” Scott sighed, meeting up with Stiles and I near his jeep.

I nodded, pointing with my chin, “Danny’s over there.”

“Danny.” Scott greeted him. I hung back, hiding myself behind Stiles.

“Can we get in the jeep?”

“Uh, yeah.”

“OH MY GOD! I AM NOT GETTING BACK THERE!” I shrieked. Jackson was in Stiles’ backseat, naked.

“Okay I couldn’t get anything out of Danny.” Scott tried to hop in the passenger seat. I shook my head and scooted closer to Stiles. Scott sighed and scooted into the jeep.

“Okay can we just get the hell outta here now? Before one of my dad’s deputies sees me?”

Fate would have it that Stiles dad, saw him instead.

“Oh my god, oh my god! Could this get any worse. That was rhetorical.” Stiles pointed his finger at me.

“Get rid of him.” Scott leaned over me.

“Get rid of him? We’re at a crime scene, and he’s the sheriff!”

“Do something.” Scott ducked into the backseat. Stiles grumbled and got out of his jeep and made his way to his dad.

Jackson groaned. “Jackson be quiet.” Scott hissed. I hopped out of the car. I can’t be with naked Jackson.

“You’re not gay.” The sheriff put his hands on his hips.

“Wha- I could be!”

“Not dressed like that.” I almost snorted at the Sheriff’s words.

“Well, what’s uh.”

“This is the second crime scene that you’ve just happened to show up on, and at this point I’ve been fed so many lies that I’m not sure I know the kid standing in front of me. Now what the hell is going on?”

“Dad, I –I –”

“The truth Stiles.”

“To be fair, sir, saying that Stiles can’t be gay because of how he’s dressed is perpetuating a stereotype.”

I said as I walked up behind Stiles, placing a hand on his shoulder.

Mr. Stilinski eyed me but said nothing.

“The truth, all right, well the truth is that we were here with Danny. Yeah, ‘cause he just broke up with his boyfriend, so, you know, we were just trying to take him out and get his mind off of things, that’s it.”

Mr. Stilinski looked at me for confirmation, I nodded.

“Well, that’s really good of you guys. You’re good friends.”

“Danny deserves a lot better, sir. He’s too nice to be sad.” I offered.

Stiles flashed me a thankful smile.

“You kids get out of here. and Ellison, we’ll talk about dinner later.”

I nodded and skipped off to the jeep, pulling Stiles along.

“Uh, what about your house?” Scott and Stiles were trying to figure out where to hold Jackson. I was just thankful I was in the front and Scott was in the back with naked Jackson.

“Not with my mom there. We need to take him somewhere we can hold him long enough to figure out what to do with him. Or long enough to convince him he’s dangerous.”

“Elli?”

“My aunt’s coming back in the morning.”

“I say we just kill him.”

“We’re not killing him.” Scott and I exclaimed in unison.

“God, fu –okay. Okay. I’ve got an idea.”

“Does it involve breaking the law?” Scott didn’t sound impressed.

“By now, don’t you think that’s a given?”

“I was trying to be optimistic.”

“Don’t bother.” Stiles sighed.

Apparently breaking the law meant stealing a police vehicle and having Scott drive it into the middle of the preserve and locking naked Jackson in it.

“Okay, I’m taking Elli home. and I’ll bring back some food okay?” Stiles nodded to Scott. “I already put pants on him, I’m not getting that close to his junk again, got it Scott. Make sure those pants stay on.”

I yawned. As much as I wanted to stay and help, I also really wanted to get some sleep.

The drive was silent.

“Hey, E. Thanks. I think my dad trusts you more than me though.”

“I must have one of those faces.” I leaned back closing my eyes.

“Yeah, you do.”

“At least I’m not being pervy. I could ask you how big Jackson’s junk is. But I don’t want to know. In fact I don’t even want to think about that. Ever.”

Stiles snorted. “I don’t want to think about it either.”

“So you’re definitely not gay then.” I grinned teasingly, I could about imagine the face Stiles was making right now.

“I could be!”

“Not if you don’t want to think about guy junks.” I smirked, tiredly.

“You are incredibly annoying.” Stiles groaned, putting his jeep in park in my driveway.

“You hang out with me anyway.” I smirked, getting out of the jeep. “Have fun babysitting Jackson. And you might want to take some bleach to that backseat, I’m not getting back there unless it’s been sterilized from Jackson’s man stuff touching it.”

“Noted.”

Stiles waited until I had unlocked the door before he even started to back his jeep out of the driveway. I waved at him and closed the door, locking it behind me.

My phone buzzed.

_‘Stay safe, Taylor.’_

_‘don’t text and drive, stilinski!’_

_‘I’m at a red light!_ ’


	18. Chapter 18

School the next morning was a wreck. Aside from Stiles ditching to baby-sit Jackson’s van, which left me with no one to nerd with, Allison’s mom subbed in the one class that Allison and Scott sat near enough to each other to talk. It was so uncomfortable to watch her mom grilling Scott about what they had been doing in class.

 ‘ _They know Jackson’s missing_.’ I frowned, ‘ _let me guess, you told his parents he loved them or something?_ ’

‘ _Ugh. Maybe._ ’

‘ _smart._ ’

‘ _Gerard told Allison his parents went to the police. We had to move him. Scott’s talking to Danny at the hospital._ ’

‘ _good luck with that then._ ’

‘ _Don’t sound so pessimistic_.’

‘ _try not to die then_.’

I didn’t hear back from Stiles for a while. I managed to crank out half of my essay and finish most of my homework for the next week before I heard back from him. By that point I was curled up on the sofa under a pile of blankets with the ceiling fans on high, watching trash tv.

‘ _I have to tell my dad_.’ I bit back a groan at the message.

_‘about?”_

_‘Everything.’_

_‘shit. that bad?’_

_‘Unfortunately._ ’

I sighed. ‘ _do you need moral support?_ ’

Half of me wanted him to say no, to stay home, stay safe. I was feeling icky and I didn’t want to move. But at the same time, I knew I needed to be available to him and Scott, and Allison and Lydia. Also I just wanted to not have to get information second hand for once.

‘ _Would you mind?_ ’

‘ _not at all._ ’

‘ _I’ll be there in ten with Scott_.’

I heaved myself off of the sofa and made my way into the bathroom to take Tylenol. Groaning I hurried down the stairs with my purse in one hand and my shoes in the other, “I’m coming, Jesus, Stilinki!” I yelled at the knocks on the door. Swinging open the door, I glared at Stiles.

“Sorry, nervous.”

“That’s what I’m here for. Moral support.” I patted Stiles’ arm, locking the door behind me. “To the jeep! Scott! Backseat.”

Scott rolled his eyes but moved to the backseat anyway. Stiles opened the door for me and jogged around to the driver’s side.

“Thanks, again, E. Seriously.”

“The more people you have to back your story the better.” I shrugged, trying to get my shoes on.

Stiles was a wreck by the time we got to the station.

“Can you buzz us in? I gotta see my dad.” Stiles nervously tapped his fingers against the front desk I grabbed his hand to stop him. The lady looked unamused by Stiles, but moved to buzz him in anyway.

“Scott, Stiles, prefect timing.” Mr Stilinski greeted the boys as they walked in, he nodded at me over Stiles’ shoulder. “Have you met Jackson’s father? Mr. David Whittemore, Esquire?”

 _Oh shit_. Stiles squeezed my hand.

I spotted Jackson sitting on the other side of his dad with the biggest shit eating grin. “That means lawyer.”

“Very well spotted, Jackson.” I pushed myself between Stiles and Scott. Jackson’s dad frowned.

“Who’s that?”

“Ellison Taylor, étudiant, that means student.” I pursed my lips at Jackson and put my hand out for Mr. Whittemore to shake. He eyed my hand before putting his hand in mine, I made sure to have a firm business hand shake going.

He turned to his son. “She’s not on the papers.”

“She wasn’t there.” Jackson scowled. “She just hangs out with those idiots.”

“I would take offense to that, but they are idiots.”

“What are you doing?” Stiles hissed in my ear. I dug my nails into the back of his hand and glared at him.  Stiles’ face contorted in pain.

“Do I need to add her?”

Jackson caught my glare and sighed, “No.”

“Scott, Stiles, have a seat.” Mr. Stilinski sighed.

I found myself rolling my eyes at nearly everything Jackass and his dad were saying to Mr. Stilinski about Stiles and Scott.  Both the boys were extremely tense throughout the whole thing, especially Scott after the Sheriff had to call his mom to let her know about the restraining order.

“Good-bye, sir.” I wiggled my finger at Jackson’s dad as he left the room to file papers, and avoided looking at Jackson as he passed so I wouldn’t be tempted to make a face.

Mr. Stilinski stood up. “You will not go within 50 feet of Jackson Whittemore. You will not speak to him, you will not approach him. You will not assault or harass him physically or psychologically.”

“What about school?”

“You can attend classes while attempting to maintain a 50 foot distance.”

“Bu –okay, what if we both have to use the bathroom at the same time and there’s only two stalls available and they’re right next to each other?” Stiles’ dad glared at him, “I’ll just hold it.”

“Do I need to remind you how lucky we are that they’re not pressing charges?”

“Oh come on it was just a joke!”

“It was a joke?”

“YES! I didn’t think it would be taken this seriously. Dad, humor’s very subjective, okay? I mean we’re talking like multiple levels of interpretation here.”

I snorted, catching both their attention. I looked down at my hands.

“And how do you feel about all this then, Ellison?”  the Sheriff said tapping his foot.

Uh-oh, “Well sir, honestly I don’t know how Scott or Stiles will manage to not “harass or assault” Jackson when they’re on the same lacrosse team, they scrimmage. It’s a violent sport. They’re bound to hit each other at some point, and Jackson can totally try and call foul on it, which is insanely ridiculous, if you ask me.  Plus there are classes with assigned seating where Jackass, er, I mean Jackson, is sitting right behind those two and I really don’t think those classes are 50 by 50.  Jackson’s just too used to things going his way and he’s mad that he wasn’t in control. If you ask me someone’s peed in his cheerios a few too many times too.”

Stiles bit his lip, trying to hid his grin.

“Uh-huh.” Mr. Stilinski had the ghost of a grin on his face.

“Uh-huh.” Stiles nodded at his dad.

“So how an I supposed to interpret the stolen prison transportation van, huh?” Mr. Stilinski turned back to his son.

“We filled the tank!” Stiles threw his hands in the air. Mr. Stilinski raised an eyebrow at me over Stiles’ shoulder.

“I had no part in this, sir. Innocent bystander.” I pushed myself up from the bench. “I’m just going to… go wait in the hall.”

Mr. Stilinski nodded, Stiles sent me a wide-eyed glance and shook his head.

I went into the hall and slid down the wall a little away from the door. Scott was pulled into the hallway by his mom.

“It’s not just this! Although, a restraining order is a new low that I didn’t think that you would reach quite this soon. It’s everything on top of it! The completely bizarre behavior, the late nights coming home, having to beg Mr. Harris for you to make up that chemistry test that you missed!” I slowly scooted further down the hall away from the pair, trying to make it look like I wasn’t listening to them.

“I missed a chemistry test?”  oh, Scott.

“Really, Scott? Really?! I have to ground you! I am grounding you, you are grounded.”

I watched from the corner of my eyes, hoping that Mrs. McCall wouldn’t see me.

“What about work?” Scott reasoned.

“Fine, other than work. And no TV!”  Mrs. McCall is a softy, it’s obvious Scott’s usually a decent kid.

“My TV’s broken.”

I rolled my eyes, if it was me I’d agree to that punishment BECAUSE my TV was broken.

“Then no computer.”

“I need the computer for school.”

“Then, no, uh, no Stiles!”

The boy in question had just tapped me with the toe of his shoe.

“What –no Stiles?”

“No Stiles! And no more car privileges. Give me your keys. Give ‘em to me!” Melissa struggled to get Scott’s car key off the ring. “Oh for the love of God.”

“Mom do you want me to…”

“No.”

“Mom, come on. Let me just…mom, mom!”

“What is going on with you? Is this about Allison?”

“Do you really want to know?”

“Yeah is this about your father? It is isn’t it? Okay you know what, um, we’ll talk about this at home. I’m going get the car.”

“I’m the worst son ever.” It was like watching a tennis match, where I felt very bad for both teams and like I shouldn’t be watching.

“Well…I’m not exactly winning any prizes either.” Stiles slid down the wall next to me.

“Neither of you are bad sons.” I frowned, leaning my head on Stiles’ shoulder. “You did what you had to do. I mean you don’t make the best choices, but, you did what you did with the best intentions.”

Stiles’ shoulders sagged a little as he let his head rest on mine.

“Damn it! You give him a restraining order and he’s mocking you?! He was –and what do I do about going to the bathroom? What the hell.” I resisted the urge to stick my foot out and trip Mr. Whittemore as he passed pulling Jackson by the arm, that would have probably resulted in an actual lawsuit. Apparently Stiles had the same idea I did because he put his hand on my ankle to stop me.

Scott frowned, “I’ll see you tomorrow I guess.” He waved at the pair of us feebly.

“Bye Scott!” I called. Stiles removed his hand from my ankle to wave bye to his friend. “Well at least she didn’t take his cell phone away.”

“Yeah.”

“Look, it’s not that bad. I mean Jackson can’t come and harass you two either.”

“I guess.”

“You two, get out of here. Stiles, take her home and go straight home yourself.” Mr. Stilinski walked over to us.

Stiles didn’t even bother trying to complain. He pushed himself up off the wall.  I moved to push myself up as well, but Stiles stuck his hand in my face to help me up. I took his hand.

“See you around, sir.” I nodded at Mr. Stilinski, he nodded back, but he was watching his son carefully. Stiles dropped my hand as soon as I was steady on my feet.

Stiles avoided his dad’s gaze, guiding me forward with a hand on my back. Once we were outside of the station, Stiles broke his silence.

“I’m sorry.”

“Stiles.”

“No. Hear me out.” Stiles licked his lips. “I’m sorry you had to see my dad like that, and I’m sorry you had to witness that whole thing. But… but thanks, for, saying what you did to my dad about Jackson.”

I shrugged. “I think your dad knew Jackson was being dumb and over reacting. He’s just… stuck between being dad and being sheriff.”

Stiles stopped outside of his jeep and pulled me into a hug.

When we finally pulled apart Stiles mumbled “Sorry. Erm. Let’s get you home.”

“Yeah. And hopefully you’ll be able to maintain a 50 foot distance while doing it.” I joked. Stiles snorted.

I hopped out of Stiles’ jeep when he stopped in front of my house.

“See you tomorrow?”

“Yeah, hey how about I pick you up?”

“Sure, yeah. I’d like that.”

Stiles’ head bobbed. “okay, yeah. I’ll, uh, I’ll text you before I come by.”

“Okay.” I nodded. “Good night, Stilinski.”

“Night, Taylor.”

 ~*~

Somehow I was roped into the weird secretive library meeting between Allison, Scott, and Stiles. Stiles hissed at me from the row of books over to stand just within the sight of the cameras so it would look like Allison was meeting up with me.

I flipped through a book on the Salem Witch Trials idly, pretending to write down notes on a sticky note. When I spotted Allison coming through the doors, she made a big show of spotting me and hurrying over to pretend to ask me something. I closed the book and set it on the shelf, sticking the sticky to my forefinger.

“Hey, where are they?”

“Down the next row.”

Allison gently grabbed my arm and pulled me down the row of books, we pretended to talk until we were out of the camera’s scope.

When we reached the gap in the books, I leaned against the shelves.

“This is everything Lydia could translate.” Allison shoved a tablet through the opening that Scott and Stiles had created. “And trust me, she was very confused.”

“Yeah? What’d you tell her?”

“That we were part of an online gamming community that battles mythical creatures.”

“I am part of an online gaming community that battles mythical creatures.”

“Oh.”

“I’m surprised she bought that.” I added. All three glanced at me, “Well, I mean most online gamming communities have the resources you need to further your game, you know, built in the game.”

Allison rolled her eyes at me. “Great.”

“Okay does it say how to find out who’s controlling him?”

“I say we just invite Jackson somewhere and see if he’s hanging around someone he doesn’t usually.” I muttered a bit bitterly, no one was listening. Stiles caught my eye, sending me a sympathetic smile, he still wanted to kill Jackson though.

“Not really, but Stiles was right about the murderers.”

“YES!” Stiles punched the air.

“AND Ellison, hello! I’m the one who mentioned it in the first place.” I grumbled.

“It calls the Kanima a weapon of vengeance. There’s a story in there about how this South American priest who used the kanima to execute murderers in his villiage…”

“All right, see, so maybe it’s not all that bad.”

“Until the bond grew strong enough that it killed whoever he wanted it to.”

“All bad. All very, very bad.”

“Here’s the thing though. The Kanima’s actually supposed to be a werewolf, But it can’t be…”

“Until it resolves that in it’s past which manifested it.” Scott read from the tablet.

“We’ll be here for a while then. Jackson seems to have a lot of… possible things that could manifest that part of him.” I leaned my head back.

“Okay if that means that Jackson could use a few thousand hours of therapy, I could have told you that myself.” Stiles frowned.

“What if it has something to do with his parents? His real parents.”

“Wait what? Real-real parents?”

“Yeah does anybody actually know what happened to them?” Scott continued on, all of them ignoring me.

“Come on guys! Seriously!” I pouted.

“Lydia might.” Stiles added.

“What if she doesn’t know anything?” Scott frowned.

“Well, he doesn’t have a restraining order against me, so I’ll talk to him myself.” Allison shrugged.

"Yep. Everyone ignore Ellison then act like she’s vital when it’s convenient.” I walked a little down the isle.

“Okay what do I do?”

“You have a make up exam, remember? Promise me.”

“If he does anything you run the other way.”

I picked up a book on some wildly haunted house and pretended to flip through it.

“I can take care of myself.”

“Hell yeah, Allison. Girl power.” I commented, not expecting any reply. 

I could hear Stiles snort at that, I spotted his eyes over the tops of the books.

“Allison, if you get hurt while I’m busy with some stupid test, someone’s going to nee to take care of me. If he does anything…”

“Like?”

“Anything! Weird or bizarre, anything!”

“Anything evil. Ah ow!” even from a row over I could tell the Scott hit Stiles pretty lightly.

Scott disappeared through around the back of the shelves, pulling Stiles out with him. Allison walked over to me and looked at the book in my hands with feigned interest.

“I don’t know why none of you listen to me.” I whispered.

“Oh stop.” Allison sighed.

I shoved the book roughly back on the shelf. “Let’s get out of here.”

“Yeah I need to stop by my locker.” Allison looped her arm around mine and pulled me out of the door the way she had come in, this time without faked conversation. “So what’s up with you and Stiles?”

“Me and… whaaaaat?” I laughed uncomfortably. I glanced up and down the halls half expecting to see Stiles roaming around.

“Oh, come on.” Allison nudged me.

“He likes Lydia.” I looked down at our feet.

“So,” Allison shrugged, “maybe he’s changed his mind. You’re allowed to do that you know. Plus it’s not like Lydia’s given him the light of day.”

“Yeah but.” I frowned, glancing at the tall brunette, “you don’t go from liking  the same someone since you were 8 to liking someone else in under a month.” I shrugged. “Can we just drop it.”

“Alright.” Allison sighed, moving to open her locker, “but just admit that you like him and _I’ll_ drop it.”

“Maybe I like his stupid face just a little.” I mumbled through pursed lips.

“I guess I’ll take it.” Allison rolled her eyes, grinning widely.

“Promise you won’t say anything to anyone. Especially not Scott, Stiles, OR Lydia.”

“I promise, goodness.” Allison held up two fingers in a girl scout promise.

I leaned up against the lockers next to hers, waiting for her to exchange her books. She sighed and pulled off her heels.

“Oh you just scared the hell out of me.”

I frowned and looked around Allison’s locker for the voice. Matt stood there looking very fakely shocked.

“Sorry, I was –I was just…um… I was nothing.”

“Ah, that’s a nice heels?”

“Oh yeah uh my feet were hurting so…”

“Same reason I never wear mine.”

“What?” Allison looked from Matt to me in confusion, I shrugged.

“Uh, forget it.” He eyed me nervously. “Hey did you hear about the underground show? Apparently they’ve got some big name spinning.”

What language is this kid talking? What underground show?

“Oh you mean like a rave?” So Allison didn’t know either.

“Oh is it still a rave if you don’t roll? I just call it a party but hey, I got a friend who can hook us up with tickets if you’re down, want me to get you one?” Wow, try harder why don't you.

“Yeah, yeah great.”

“Sorry, Ellison, I can only get one other ticket.”

I waved him off, “I’m not a party girl anyway.”

“Yeah, alright, cool. Um it’s Friday so… looking forward to it.”

“Yeah.” Allison turned to me with a confused expression on her face, as Matt walked away.  “What did I just do?” Allison whispered looking a little horrified.

“Well,” I smirked, “I think you just agreed to a date with a guy while you have a boyfriend.”

“I have to find Jackson.” Allison slammed her locker shut, “Come help me look?”

“Yeah sure, maybe we’ll spy Lydia too.”

“or Stiles.” Allison nudged me.

“ _Stooooooooop_.” I whined.

Allison laughed and pulled me down the hallway.

“Wait here?” Allison gently pushed me back a little as she walked toward the boys locker room. I backed up against the wall next to the door she was standing in front of. ‘Boy’s Locker Room’ oh this should be good. First she agrees on a date with someone who isn’t her boyfriend, now she’s having locker room escapades, Scott’s going to love me for not stopping her.

“Jackson?”

“In here. Is something wrong?” well that sounded almost sweet.

I strained to hear the rest of the conversation as Allison disappeared into the locker room. I tapped my toes on the floor, we had class soon, it was making me anxious not already being at the room. I chewed on my lower lip.

I could hear something that sounded like Allison yelling Stop. Shit, shit, shit.

Scott ran right past me and straight into the locker room. I tasted blood in my mouth from gnawing on my lip, focusing on keeping calm. Jackson yelled something I couldn’t quite catch and I could hardly make out Scott’s low reply to him.

The door burst open and both boys tumbled out. I jumped back.

“SCOTT! SCOTT! SCOTT! GUYS!” Stiles slid to a stop,  pulling me backward a few steps then jumping in to pull Scott off of Jackson. Erica appeared not that far behind him.

Allison grabbed onto my arm.

“What the hell is going on!? Hey! Enough!” Mr. Harris pulled Jackson back.  Stiles quickly let go of his best friend and moved to stand protectively in front of me and Allison. “What do you two idiots think you’re doing. Jackson! Calm down! Mr. McCall, you want to explain yourself? Stilinski?”

I hadn’t seen Matt show up, but there he was, holding Allison’s tablet out, “You dropped this.”

“You and you! Actually, all of you! Detention. Three o’clock!” Harris looked around at everyone.

I grabbed Allison’s arm and pulled her off to French. Wanting to get as far away from Scott and Jackson as quickly as possible.

“Ell!” Stiles called after me. I kept walking, pulling Allison along.

“We can’t be late for class.” I muttered, trying to avoid her gaze.


	19. Chapter 19

By 3, I wasn’t in such a great mood. I’d never had so much as a conduct mark since that one time in grade school where I accidentally hit someone and here I was going to detention. When I told that to Allison she laughed.

“I can’t believe you hit someone.”

“I was an accident.” I whined, pouting.

“That, I believe.” She giggled, pulling me into the library where Harris was hosting his detention.

Allison pulled me to a table and left me at a seat while she took the one across from me. Stiles pulled up a chair next to me.

“Oh, Uh, we can’t be in detention together. I have a restraining order against these tools.”

I rolled my eyes. How long is Jackson going to hold onto that.

“All these tools?” Harris really shouldn’t talk to students like that, especially in front of them.

“No just us tools.” Stiles sighed, pointing to him and Scott.

“Fine you two over there.”

Stiles sent me a small smile as he got up and moved to a table across the library. Erica glanced over her shoulder at me. My eyes slid past her to Scott and Stiles, they were bent close together whispering, probably about Jackson. Allison’s face slid into my line of vision, her eyebrows raised in amusement.

“Shut up.”

“I didn’t say anything.”

I frowned at her and pulled out my French homework a bit angrily. I’m angry at Harris for putting everyone in detention when we weren’t even involved, I’m angry at Scott for acting like a bat out of hell and probably being the reason Harris even appeared in the first place since he was supposed to be taking a make up test with him and I’m a little annoyed at Stiles because I like him, there I admitted it to myself, and I’m pissed at Jackson for whatever he said to Allison that made Scott act like he did. Allison slid a small folded paper into my line of vision. I rolled my eyes and slid it under my book so Harris wouldn’t snatch it and slowly unfolded it.

_Stiles keeps looking over here. are you mad at him?_

**_No but I’m a little mad at his best friend for landing us all in detention._ **

_I would say it’s not his fault, but, it kind of is. You should be mad at Harris instead._

**_Oh trust me I am._ **

Allison frowned, but didn’t reply. I glanced up to see Stiles duck so he wasn’t staring anymore.

“You okay?” I looked up again. Matt was eyeing Jackson.

“I have to go to the bathroom.” Jackson abruptly got up with his bag.

“Are you all right?” Harris stood up. Oh yeah care about him why don’t you, “Hey, you don’t look so good.”

“I just need some water.” Jackson flew out the doors.

“No one leaves their seats.” Harris ordered, following Jackson. As soon as he was out of sight, Stiles and Scott moved out of their seats toward Erica.

I rubbed the side of my face and dug around in my bag for some thing to do but came up short. I put my head down on my open French notes and tried to drown out everyone’s conversations, specifically the one that Stiles, Erica, and Scott were having.

“You okay?” Allison whispered, I felt her hand on my arm.

“I guess, I'm just tired.” I lifted my head a little and caught a sympathetic glance from Matt. I removed my glasses and put my head back down.

“Scott McCall, please report to the principal’s office.” Allison’s mother’s disembodied voice came from the speaker.

A few minutes later, someone loudly dragged the chair out next to mine. I squinted at the shoes, Stiles.

“Hey,” I didn’t move or say anything. “Is she asleep?”

“Probably not.” Allison sighed.

“Are you mad at me?” Stiles sounded like he was incredibly close to my ear.

“No.” I mumbled.

Feet shuffled into the library and I didn’t bother lifting my head but it sounded like everyone was starting to gather their stuff.

“Oh I’m sorry. Yes I’m leaving, but none of you are. You may go when you’re done with the re-shelving. Enjoy the rest of your evening.” Harris sounded so smug with himself.

I slowly pushed my head up to get to the re-shelving so I could leave and take a nap and get something to eat. I narrowly missed hitting Stiles’ head when I got up.

I made my way over to one of the carts and started picking up books that should go in the same section. I just wanted to get it done and get out of there.

Everyone slowly got up, following my lead.

Stiles appeared at my elbow. “Are you sure you’re not mad at me? Because you seem mad, and I wouldn’t blame you if you are, even if it’s just because of Scott or something. Actually you can be mad at me for no reason, that’s fine too.”

“I’m not mad at you, Stiles.” I turned with the stack of books in my hand and headed off to the shelves.

“Really because.” Stiles caught up with me, a stack of books in his hand. “It really seems like you might be.”

“If you keep asking me if I’m mad at you, I’m going to get mad at you. I just… I really want to get out of here, okay?” I looked over at Stiles, he nodded vigorously.

“Okay. Yeah. Okay.”

Scott came back and joined us. Stiles started filling him in on whatever it was.

“It means he was born after his mom died… by c-section. They had to pull her out of his dead body.

“So was it an accident or not.”

“To be honest this conversation is making me a bit queasy, I’ll be over there.” I bowed out of the isle they were down, trying not to feel bad about the expression on Stiles’ face.

I went down the isle where Erica was shelving, deciding I’d rather be near her than Matt.

The lights started to flicker a bit, a few shelves started to fall, and Erica dropped to the ground, seizing. I dropped to my knees and turned her on her size, panicking a little myself as I tried to make sure Erica was okay.

“ERICA!” Scott ran down the isle at us.

“Whoa, hey, hey, hey, hey!” Stiles ran up behind him

“I think she’s having a seizure.” I wheezed out, trying not to have a panic attack over it.

Stiles pulled me up as Scott swooped down next to Erica.

“Matt’s alive.” Allison peered around the isle at us. I hadn’t even thought about Matt a few isles over where one of the shelves collapsed.

“Hey, we need to get her to a hospital.” Stiles nodded to Erica while trying to subtly calm me down.

Scott scooped her up.

“To Derek.” Erica mumbled.

“Go.” Allison urged.

“I’m staying here with you.”

“Stiles can’t take her alone, and Elli’s in no state to go. Not like this. And Matt –I’ve got to call an ambulance for him, just go.”

“This doesn’t feel right.”

“It’s okay.” Allison reassured him.

“No, it’s not, it’s not right.”

“Scott I’ll stay with her.” I moved away from Stiles a little, trying to put on a braver face so that they would go.

“Okay.” Scott frowned.

“You sure you’ll be okay?” Stiles touched my arm.

“Yeah, go be Batman. I’ll catch a ride with Allison home too.”

Stiles nodded and hurried out the library with Scott.

Allison and I locked eyes.  She sighed tiredly, “now what?”

I drew a shaky breath. We both knew we needed to get her mom.


	20. Chapter 20

“Thanks for the ride home, Mrs. Argent.” I waved back at Allison.  Allison had rode to school with her mom, and thankfully her mom offered to drive me home anyway after I wound up inducing a panic attack on myself in front of her and Sheriff Stilinski when the ambulance arrived for Matt. I’m pretty sure Mrs. Argent thought I was faking it, probably because she had been watching the cameras, and when Mr. Stilinski saw that she wasn’t acting all that kind about it he said something to her about me having panic attacks in stressful situations that shut her up pretty quickly.

I threw my hair up in a bun and went take a long bath to wash away the stress of the day. I knew I looked pretty wrecked, with the combination of the kanima attack in the library and the sort of panic attack that I had, my eyes were a little red and my whole body ached.  Thankfully the bath melted away the aches and my headache, but it did nothing for my slightly red eyes.

The door bell rang repeatedly.

“I’m coming!” I yelled, hurrying into a pair of grey leggings and scooped a fitted lavender hoodie from my floor. I took the steps three at a time.

“Stiles?”

“Are you okay!? My dad told me you had a panic attack! I knew I shouldn’t have left you there.” Stiles barreled into my hugging me tight.

“Stiles, I’m fine.”

He pulled away from me, holding me at arms length, studying me closely. Stiles’ face went a bit pink. “Hey, put on some shoes, come have dinner with me and my dad down at the station. I know it’s not home cooked like he wanted, but you should come have dinner with us.”

I hesitated.

“My dad told me to invite you.” Stiles released my arms and rubbed the back of his neck, “right after he told me you had a panic attack and I was trying to run out of there to get here. I mean, you know, unless you still don’t feel well.”

I nodded slowly. “Okay, let…let me go get my shoes and my bag.”

Stiles nodded bouncing on his heels, “I’ll just… wait here.”

I took my time gathering my things together and making my way back down the stairs.

“Ready?”

“Yep.” I held up the pair of TOMS in my hand. I put a hand on Stiles’ shoulder for balance and shoved my feet in the TOMS one at a time. I stumbled a bit trying to put on my left shoe, Stiles’ hand went against my lower back to balance me.

"So where's your aunt?" Stiles looked around at the silent house.

"Uh." I spotted a yellow sticky note on the wall near the door and plucked it up once I had both feet in my shoes. "On a date it would seem."

"With who?" Stiles' nose wrinkled as he read it over my shoulder.

' _Out on a date tonight! Be good! Eat something from the freezer. Love you!'_

"Lots of exclamation points." Stiles snorted.

i stuck the note back on the wall and ushered Stiles out the front door, locking it behind us.

“So.”

“So, uh… I hope you don’t mind take out?”

“No… uh… not at all.”

Stiles nodded, helping me into the passenger seat before jogging around to the drivers side himself.

“Yeah, so we’ll pick it up and eat down at the station. Hopefully we can find out what the police know about the Kanima stuff.”

Stiles ordered for me, and when I tried to pay he insisted it was on him.

“You’re so stubborn.” Stiles groaned, turning into the police parking lot.

“Oh please. So what?”

“So what? So what?!” Stiles shook his head. “Let’s go.”

We made our way to the Sheriff’s office.

“Hello, Mr. Stilinski!”

“Ellison, glad you could make it.”

“Yeah well, just so you know, I’m not responsible for your supper. It’s all Stiles.” I smirked, Mr. Stilinski raised an eyebrow at me. Stiles hurried in the room. I sat down in a chair against the wall.

“Sorry, dad. I almost ran into that deputy that doesn’t like me, he’s so … ugh.” Stiles grumbled, putting the bag of food on the desk and doled out the food.

“Oh what the hell is this?”

“Veggie burger.” Stiles looked unfazed by his father’s objections, handing me my chicken burger.

“Stiles I asked for a hamburger.”

“Well veggie is healthier. We’re being healthy.”

“Oh hell, why are you trying to ruin my life?” Mr. Stilinski glanced at me.

“Chicken burger.”

“He’s got you on this too?”

“No. I told him there was no way you’d be for a veggie burger, but he insisted. I actually just really like chicken.” I shrugged.

Stiles groaned, “I’m trying to extend your life, okay? Could you just eat it please? And tell me what you found.”

I slid Mr. Stilinski a few of my onion rings when Stiles wasn’t looking. Mr. Stilinski grinned and slid them into his burger, I winked.

“I’m not sharing confidential police work with a pair of teenagers.”

“Is that it on the board behind you?” I followed Stiles’ eyes but couldn’t make out any of the words properly.

“Don’t look at that.”

“Good thing I can't make anything out then sir.”

“Ay-”

“Avert your eyes.” Mr. Stilinski pointed a finger at Stiles.

“Okay.” Stiles got up and walked around the desk.

“Hey!”

“Just –it’s just… I see arrows pointing at pictures.”

“And that makes you curious?” I laughed, shamelessly egging him on.

“Okay, okay, stop, fine.” Mr. Stilinski pulled his son away from the board, he stumbled and sat down next to me. “I found something. The mechanic and the couple where were murdered, they all had something in common.”

“All three?” Stiles glanced at me. I shrugged.

“Yeah, you know what they say. One’s an incident, two’s a coincidence…”

“Three’s a pattern.” Stiles and I finished simultaneously.

The Sheriff looked at me then back at his son, I could feel Stiles’ eyes on the side of my face.

“The mechanic, the husband, the wife, all the same age, all 24.”

“Wait what about Mr. Lahey? I mean, Isaac’s dad isn’t anywhere near 24.”

“Unless he was, a teen daddy.” I shrugged.

“Which makes me think that either, A. Lahey’s murder wasn’t connected, or B. the ages were a coincidence, until I found this, which would be C. did you know Isaac Lahey had an older brother named Camden?” The sheriff opened a file on his desk.

Stiles and I leaned over the file.

“Died in combat?”

“But if he were alive today, take one guess how old he’d be.”

“24” I said quietly.

“Now what if the same age means same class…I mean, did you think of that?”

“Yeah yeah, well I would’ve I mean, I … look I just got Lahey’s file two hours ago.” Mr. Stilinski looked a little stressed.

“Two hours? Dad, people could be dying! Right Ell?”

“I…”

“Yeah I’m aware of that. Thank you.”

“Same class.”

I did the mental math, 24 minus 18 is…6, and six years school years ago it was…“2006.”

Stiles looked at me. “Genius.” He quickly grabbed the 2006 folder.

“Okay this is it, class of 2006, they all went to Beacon Hills.”

Mr. Stilinski looked at where Stiles was pointing, his eyes scanned the list of names. “Including Isaac’s brother.”

“That can’t be a coincidence.” I frowned at the papers.

“All right, but so what if they all knew each other, you know? I mean two of them were married, so maybe they all just hung out?”

“That’s possible, Stiles, but there has to be something else to it.” I pointed at the list, who would have a vendetta against a group of people who hung out?”

“Well they could have had the same classes together? They could’ve …”

“What?”

“Same teacher.” Mr. Stilinski moved the paged around.

“Harris. They were all in his class?” Stiles asked.

“Well that’s what the paper says.” Stiles pushed my shoulder.

“All four, and I don’t know how Mr. Lahey fits in but this kid, this is definitely a patter. All right give me the 2006 year book, these names we need faces.”

“Which  ones?”

“Everyone in that Chem class. If the killer’s not done killing…”

“One of them is next.”

“What if it wasn’t a class, it had to be something outside of school that still meant they’d all be together, maybe something that Mr. Lahey would have chaperoned or something? And something went awry?”

Stiles ignored my comment, trying to find the 2006 yearbook. Mr. Stilinski nodded, “It’s possible, but this is a good lead.”

Stiles set the yearbook on the table and went to start flipping through it. Mr. Stilinski grabbed the yearbook from him. “How about we finish up here and look at it later? Meanwhile I’ll get a deputy to look at the list and send a few cars out to patrol the area.”

We finished up and I helped Mr. Stilinski clean up the desk while Stiles ran to photocopy the class page for Harris.

“This isn’t exactly what I imagined when I said you’d have to have dinner with us.” Mr. Stilinski apologized.

I shrugged, “it felt normal. Besides I would have felt uncomfortable if you had made a big thing of cooking.”

“You and my son seem to think a lot alike.”

“Not really. I’m more sensible.” I smirked. Mr. Stilinski laughed.

“Is your dad in the force?” the smile slipped from my face a little.

“Uh, yeah. He was.”

“Oh. I’m sorry.” Mr. Stilinski looked like he regretted saying anything.,

“It’s fine. It… it doesn’t bother me much, he wasn’t really around. And it’s kind of complicated. You know what they say, no body, not really dead.” I shrugged.  “Uh. Can you not… mention that to Stiles…”

Mr. Stilinski nodded awkwardly.

Stiles walked back in the room with the book and a stack of papers in his hand.

“Alright, dad, this is the photocopy.” Stiles tried to keep the yearbook under his arm where his dad wouldn’t see, Mr. Stilinski rolled his eyes. “Ready to go, Ell?”

“Yeah, sure.” I shouldered my bag, “thanks again, Mr. Stilinski.”

“Maybe next time I’ll actually cook.” Mr. Stilinski joked, patting my shoulder as I walked by.

 


	21. Chapter 21

I refused a ride from Stiles the next morning, my car needed to move every now and then anyway.

I walked up behind Scott and Stiles, tugging my hair over my shoulder and out from under my backpack straps.

“There’s got to be some other way to get tickets right?”

“It’s a secret show. There’s only one way, and it’s a secret.”

“Hmm. That sounds suspicious.” I popped my head between their shoulders.

Stiles rolled his eyes at me and threw his arm over my shoulder, opening his mouth to say something back that was probably just as sarcastic as I had been, but he was cut off by Matt approaching.

“Hey, any of you guys know why no one’s getting suspended after what happened the other day?”

“Why would anyone get suspended? No one really did anything?” I frowned.

“Just forget about it. Nobody got hurt.” Stiles scoffed.

“I…I had a concussion.” Matt eyed Stiles weirdly.

“Well, nobody got seriously hurt.” Stiles rolled his eyes.

“I had a concussion.” 

“I wish I had one right now.” I grumbled quietly. Scott coughed, trying to cover a laugh.

“Well nobody was seriously hurt.” Stiles sounded very annoyed.

“I was in the E.R. for six hours.” Matt half shouted.

“What is this? A pissing contest.” I mumbled. Scott once again almost lost it, struggling to hold his composure.

“Hey, do you want to know the truth, Matt? Your little bump on the head is about… THIS high on our list of problems right now” Stiles snapped, his arm slid from my shoulder as he bent down low to the ground to show Matt exactly how high off the ground his issues were.

Scott sighed, “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine now.” Matt glared at Stiles, “So you didn’t get any tickets last night either?”

“Are they still selling?” Scott leaned forward a bit.

“Uh no, but I managed to find two online.” Matt shrugged. “You should keep trying, sounds like everyone’s gonna be there.” And with that Matt actually flounced off.

“I don’t like him,” Stiles frowned and turned to Scott. “Hey are you sure about this?”

“Last time whoever’s controlling Jackson had to kill somebody because he didn’t finish the job, so what do you thin he’s going to do this time?” Scott pressed.

“Be there to make sure it happens.” Stiles said dejectedly.

“Something’s off with Matt, I can’t put my finger on it.” I frowned up at the two.

Scott shook his head and started off to morning practice, Stiles followed pulling me along.

“Okay so, let me get this straight. The two of you want to get into a secret rave, that’s sold out, to chase after that crazy homicidal lizard thing that’s probably Jackson, who’s being controlled by someone who might be far more crazy and homicidal?”

“Sounds about right yeah,” Stiles nodded, “except it’s not ‘probably’ Jackson, it is Jackson.”

“How are you going to get in?”

“Uh, we hadn’t thought of that yet, we’re trying to find tickets off someone who maybe has extras or can’t go. Problem is that we’d get, two tickets at most from that.”

“Why don’t you idiots just sneak in?”

“Uh, well..”

“There’s always a back door, assholes. And do you not remember the night with the Danny thing?”

Both boys looked at me weirdly.

“Alright, look, get tickets for yourselves if you need to. Waste money that you don't need to.”I said sardonically, I shook my head at the two of them and walked off to class.

~~

After school Allison and I wondered outside to the benches to watch their second lacrosse practice of the day, Coach was really squeezing them in whenever he could these days.

“So, have you figured out the whole… you know… thing?” I looked over at Allison, pulling out our French notes to go over. She sighed.

“I talked to Scott.” Allison whispered.

“And… deets?!” I hit her shoulder lightly. Allison grabbed my pen and corrected a verb conjugation on my paper.

“He said to go for it… and to kiss him.”

“WHAT?!” 

“Shhhhh!”

“Oh My GoD!” I whisper yelled.

“I know.” Allison sighed.

“Why?”

“He said to make a show of it in front of my mom.” Allison fixed the spelling on her own paper.

I nodded, “That’s actually pretty smart.” Allison shot me a look. “Don’t look at me like that, your mom will think that you’re not, you know, sneaking around with Scott if she sees you out with another guy.”

“Yeah but… I really love him.” Allison gazed down at the field, finding Stiles and Scott goofing off, something where they were using their sticks as bug eyes? Allison and I shared a short laugh.

“He’s trying to protect you. I wish he would be so adamant about it though. You’re one hell of a fighter.”

“Stiles doesn’t try that with you?” Allison glanced at Scott and Stiles again before turning her attention to me.

“I'm going to disregard your intentions with that question, but I think my aunt kind of scared him into thinking I’m some kind of karate master, but he does try to keep me as far away as possible. Scott too though, I have to dig to find out anything.” I whined.

Allison laughed, “at least you don’t have your whole family against your boyfriend.”

“Not my boyfriend.” I blushed, “but you two do have a weird Romeo and Juliet complex going on.”

“Let’s hope no one dies.” Allison giggled.

“Don’t say that. I don’t even want to think about that being a possibility.” I frowned, “I don’t want to think about losing either of my best friends.”

“Aww,” Allison cooed, “You’re my best friend too. Just don’t tell Lydia.” Allison giggled, hugging me. I laughed.

“I feel like we need to weave friendship necklaces or come up with a handshake to cement this.” I joked, wrapping my arms around Allison’s waist to hug her back.

“Scott and Stiles are looking at us weird.” Allison stage whispered.

“Let them look. A love like ours deserves to be witnessed.” I said dramatically, pulling myself away from Allison and throwing a hand to my forehead. Allison laughed loudly, throwing her head back.

On the field, Coach blew his whistle at the two idiots who were standing there with their helmets off, gawking at Allison and I. I looked at Allison and we burst out laughing again.

I knocked my shoulder with hers, “anyway, it’s not like you’re going into that rave blind. I know Scott and Stiles are going to try and get in.”

“And you’re not?” Allison quirked an eyebrow.

“I’m not really a part person…it’s a social anxiety thing.” I explained and then shrugged, “but if I get dragged along, I get dragged along.”

“My dad knows about the lizard.” Allison added lowly.

“Really? You could have brought that up earlier.”

“He saw the library footage. Thankfully he didn’t question you being there like my mom did, but he did seem to think I knew who’s controlling it.” The conversation died there.

At the end of practice, Allison and I had finished our French homework to as close to perfection as we could get it. I caught the eye of Stiles and waved bye to him as he and Scott passed to go change. Stiles nodded and mimed that he’d text me later.

“Good luck tonight, Ally.”

Allison laughed nervously.  “I shouldn’t try too hard right?”

“No. I mean try enough so it looks like you tried, but don’t like over think it. Dress nice but not ‘date with Scott’ nice.” I giggled and added, “wear your granny panties.”

Allison hit my arm, and gasped, but laughed anyway. “Thanks, Elli. So I guess I’ll see you tonight if Scott and Stiles have any say in it.”

I snorted. “Probably. I’m going to need to take a nap then.”

Allison laughed, “Drive safe, Elli.”

“You too, Ally!” I blew a dramatic kiss at Allison and skipped to my car.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really love writing scenes with Allison and Ellison, yay bonding (and homework help)!


	22. Chapter 22

After getting home I took a 2 hour long nap and woke up to several texts from Stiles and Scott telling me they got tickets for the rave and that I should get dressed and be ready for Stiles to pick me up. So I did.

“Uh, you, you look nice.” Stiles stammered when I answered the door.

I looked down at the bold daisy print dress and white wedged sandals I was wearing, it wasn’t extremely rave-approved but it was all I could do at the moment. The sparkle shirt from the pool incident had pretty much fallen apart after being washed and I was in the process of repairing it.

“We, uh, we have to stop by Deaton’s first.” Stiles stammered.

“Okay.” I nodded, “Just let me lock up and we can go.”

Stiles nodded, I could hear him bouncing up and down behind me as I locked the door.

“Where’s Scott?”

“Clinic. He had to work, so we’re also picking him up there.”

I groaned. “He’s lucky I’m wearing shorts under this dress.”

I tried to get into Stiles’ jeep with as little help and as much grace as I could, it didn’t work out too well, I almost fell out of Stiles’ jeep and probably would have if he hadn’t been standing close by and caught me by the arm.

“So, do I even want to know how you got tickets?”

“Isaac.” Stiles nodded.

“Okay. That tells me basically nothing, but okay.

~

Stiles held open the door to the Clinic, and I ducked under his arm to go in.  My shoes made soft tapping sounds across the floor of the silent clinic.

“We’re closed!” a voice called from the back.

“Nice to see you too Doctor Deaton!” Stiles called back.

“Ah Stiles, and this must be Ellison, Scott said you were coming by.” I took in the man’s appearance, the white vet’s coat was the best indication that he was Dr. Deaton.

“Hello, sir.” I nodded at Dr. Deaton, leaning on the counter. He smiled.

“Come on back then.” Deaton stayed away from the counter.

I reached out and lifted the gate. Stiles’ hand rested on my lower back, pushing me gently in front of him. I turned a little so his hand slipped from my back and grabbed his hand instead.

“Come on, Slow Stilinski.”

“Hey!” Stiles pouted.

“Bonjour Scott!” I greeted the werewolf. “Just so you know, telling your girlfriend to kiss another guy in front of her mother constitutes as sending mixed signals.”

Scott rolled his eyes at me and pointedly looked at mine and Stiles’ hands. I rolled my eyes and hopped onto the nearest stool, letting go of Stiles’ hand to hold down my dress and balance myself on the examining table to climb onto the stool.

“So what’s the plan?”

“What’s with the dress?” Scott countered, smirking.

“You said to dress for a rave. This is all I had. Everything else is uber casual or torn.” I frowned thinking of the sparkle shirt. “Now. C’mon, Scotty, what’s the plan? You can’t just fly into this by the seat of your pants and wing it.”

Out the corner of my eye I spied Deaton, smiling and nodding. Stiles leaned up against the table next to me.

Scott sighed, “Deaton.”

Dr. Deaton put a canister on the table in front of Scott.

“Ketamine?”

“What’s Ketamine?” I looked over to Scott and Deaton.

“It’s the same stuff we use on the dogs, just a higher dosage.” Dr. Deaton explained. “If you can get close enough to Jackson, it should slow him down enough to buy you some time. This is some of what you’ll use to create a barrier, this part is for you Stiles. Only you.” Deaton put a large back on the table.

“Uh, that sounds like a lot of pressure. Can we maybe find a slightly less pressure filled task for me?”

“It’s from the Mountain Ash tree, which is believed by many cultures to protect against the supernatural.” Deaton grinned, “This office is lined with ashwood, making it difficult for someone like Scott to cause me any trouble.”

“Smart.” I could appreciate that.

“Okay, so then what? I just spread this around the whole building and then either Jackson or whoever’s controlling him can’t cross it?”

Deaton nodded, “They’ll be trapped.”

“Doesn’t sound too hard.” Scott nodded, trying to reassure Stiles. “What about Ell?”

“She’ll go with Stiles, help him focus."

Stiles shifted uneasily next to me. Deaton turned to him, seeing his unrest.

“Think of it like gunpowder. It’s just powder until a spark ignites it. You need to be that spark, Stiles.”

“If you mean Elli has to light me on fire. I don’t think I’m up for that.”

I rolled my eyes. “He means metaphorically, dumbass.”

“Let me try a different analogy. I used to golf. I learned that the best golfers never swing before fist imagining where they want the ball to go. They see it in their mind and their mind takes over. It can be pretty extraordinary what the force of your own will can accomplish.”

“Force of will.” Stiles repeated, still looking uneasy.

“Use the force, Stiles.” I said in my best Obi-Wan voice. Stiles smirked.

“If this is going to work, Stiles, you have to believe it. Ellison is going to go with you to make sure you can.” Deaton smiled at me.

“Mmhmm.” Stiles hummed.

“You’re still thinking about my Obi-Wan, aren’t you?”

“Yeah.” Stiles laughed. Across the room Scott rolled his eyes.

“Let’s go.” Scott grabbed the Ketemine from the table.

I climbed into the backseat of Stiles’ jeep without waiting to be prompted. Trying hard not to show my whole butt even though I was wearing a pair of bike shorts was hard.

“Scott could have gotten back there,” Stiles’ eyes flicked nervously from his rear view mirror at me, to Scott in the passengers seat.

“It’s fine. Scott’s Scott, so.”

“Okay so that was faster than I thought, and we still have an hour till the party. So I’ll meet you two later?”

Stiles nodded, “Yeah I guess. Ell, you okay with hanging out for a few instead of having to pick you up again?”

“Sure.” I nodded.

Stiles turned the jeep around to drop Scott off at his house as per his request. Then it hit me. Neither boy was dressed for a rave, in fact they were both still in their clothes from school, and in Scott’s case, work.

“Neither of you remembered to dress before hand did you?”

“Nope.” Stiles waited for me to climb into the front seat before taking off to his house. “Okay, I’ll run in and change, and you can come in and sit or something, I’m not letting you stay in the jeep for who knows how long.”

I nodded.

Stiles haphazardly parked his Jeep at an angle in the driveway and very ungracefully fell out of his seat and onto the pavement. I laughed and attempted a much more graceful exit, only to stumble a bit on a hidden hole in the grass. Stiles took my hand and pulled me to the front door.

“Hey.” Stiles called to his dad, letting go of my hand. “Can’t talk, gotta run.” I walked over to where Mr. Stilinski sat at the table and sat on a barstool nearby. Mr. Stilinski looked more than a little downtrodden and was nursing a scotch glass. Stiles stopped short with one foot on the stairs, picking up on the same thing I did, he walked over. “Hey, wait, wait, wait, wait, what’s wrong?”

“Nothing.” Mr. Stilinski took a big gulp of his scotch.

“Oh. Where’s your gun?” Stiles glanced at me as if I knew the answer, I shrugged.

“I left it at the station along with my badge.”

“What?!” I gasped.

“It’s all right. You know what. We’ll talk about this later.” Mr. Stilinski clearly didn’t want to have the conversation in front of me.

“Dad.”

“Don’t worry about it.” Mr. Stilinski waved his hand.

“Dad!”

“It was decided that the son of a police chief stealing police property and having a restraining order filed against him by one of the town’s most respected attorneys did not reflect well on the county.”

“They fired you?” Stiles looked like he was trying not to show how upset he was.

“Nah. Look, it’s… it’s  just a leave of absence, it’s… it’s temporary.” He shot back the rest of the cup.

“D –did they say it was temporary or –” Stiles fidgeted nervously.

“Actually no, you know, I… it’s fine. Don’t worry about it. Hey? We’re going to be fine.”

“Dad.” Stiles voice cracked. I really shouldn’t be here for this. “I don’t get it. Why… why aren’t you angry at me."

Mr. Stilinski shook his head, getting up. “I don’t know.” He shrugged, “Maybe I just don’t want to feel any worse than I already do by having to yell at my son.”

Stiles glanced at me and then his dad before slowly going up the stairs and softly shutting his bedroom door.

“I’m sorry Mr. Stilinski.” I said softly. “They’re going to realize how big of a mistake it was and you’ll be back there quicker than Mary Poppins can say Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious.”

Mr. Stilinski laughed a little ruefully, turning to face me.

“I hope so.”

“Besides. I don’t think anyone else can handle the amount of crazy in this town.” I smirked. “I mean you do live with Stiles, he’s at least half as asinine as some of the things that happen here.”

That got a small smile on Mr. Stilinski’s face, which faded as soon as Stiles started making his way back down the stairs.

“Okay, let’s go, Ell.” Stiles put a hand on my shoulder. “Dad.” Stiles spoke to his father tentatively. Mr. Stilinski nodded tersely.

I took Stiles’ hand when we were out of sight of his dad and gave it a squeeze. Stiles smiled sadly at me and squeezed back, guiding me out the door and helped me into his jeep.

“We’re picking up Scotty?”                           

“Yep.”  That was the last word I heard Stiles speak till we reached the club.

When we picked up Scott, I wordlessly got into the backseat. Scott uncomfortably glanced back at me every few minutes, wordlessly trying to figure out if Stiles’ silence was because of me, no doubt.

I sat leaned forward, chin resting on the back of Stiles’ seat, trying to figure out how to get Stiles to decompress and gage if/when Stiles would implode. It wasn’t hard to tell that what his dad said to him was weighing pretty heavy on his mind, despite how much he was trying to hide it.

When we got there Stiles slid out of his seat and held his hand over the back of the seat for my hand to help me out of the backseat. Scott walked around to the back and watched Stiles. Seeing how Scott was reacting to Stiles’ silence meant that Stiles wasn’t like this often.

“You okay?” Scott finally braved to ask.

“Yeah, why?” Stiles’ voice was oddly cold and level as he opened up the back of the jeep.

“You just… didn’t say anything the whole way here.” Scott’s eyes darted from Stiles to me and back again. I shook my head when we made eye contact.

“No. I’m fine. Just grab the other bag.” Stiles sounded like he wanted to be anywhere but here.

“I can’t.” Scott frowned at his best friend. “Remember? Deaton said you have to do it alone.”

“Okay this plan is really starting to suck.” Stiles groaned. I leaned against the side of the jeep, giving Stiles and Scott some space.

“No, Not here, not now.” Scott mumbled and took off. My eyes followed Scott.

“What? Scott! What am I supposed to …” Stiles kicked some dirt and grumbled. “Plan officially sucks.”

 


	23. Chapter 23

“I’m still here.”

“I know.”

“C’mon. I get to be your personal cheerleader while you do this.” I pushed myself off the jeep and grabbed the pocket knife I had put in my cleavage just incase.

Stiles jaw dropped. “You carry a knife in there?”

“Not usually. This is a special occasion.” I held the knife out to Stiles, he just looked at it. “Are you just going to wait for the bag to open itself?”

“Oh right.” Stiles jerked into motion, taking the knife from me to cut open a small corner of the bag, and handed it back. I closed the knife and slid it back into my bra.

“What else do girls keep in there?”

“Typically? Money, ID, keys, lipstick.” I shrugged.

Stiles shook his head, starting to make the line of ash. “I’m not sure I even want to know how you can fit all that in there.”

“I can’t. Well, maybe I can. I’ve never tried. I’d rather carry a bag than have a key digging into my chest all night.” I walked slowly along with Stiles for several yards. “Are you going to tell Scott?”

“I… I don’t know. Can we just… not talk about that right now?”

“Yeah, of course.” I nodded.

“You look like me right now.”

“Hmm?” I pretended to not know what he was talking about. “So any big plans for what you’re going to do with your time once Jackson’s stopped?”

“I don’t know.” Stiles shrugged, a small smile crossing his lips. “Maybe take a pretty girl on a date.”

My stomach dropped. “Oh?” I squeaked out.

“Mhmm.” Stiles was focused on the line of ash pouring from the bag. The smile seemed to melt slowly off his face as he concentrated on the task at hand. “Oh no, ohhh no.” Stiles started moaning.

“Wha –” I turned my attention away from the side of Stiles’ face to the handful of ash left.

“What do I do? This is never going to make it.” Stiles gestured to the yards of space infront of us.

“I… I don’t know. You have to imagine it working, Stiles.”

Stiles pulled out his cell phone, “:Scott? Pick up. Pick up right now. Look I’ve got like, 50 feet of ash left and I’m out, okay? So you got to get your wolf ass down here to help me because I don’t know what to do and neither does Elli. And I’m just standing out here and I’m.. I feel alone, and I’m hearing gunfire and werewolves, and I’m … and I’m standing here like a fricken’ idiot all by myself with Elli and a handful of magic fairy dust, and I don’t have enough. Okay?” Stiles hung up and looked over at me, my heart had dropped and was laying with my stomach hearing Stiles plead with Scott’s voicemail. “Okay.”

“Stiles you can do it.” I tried to not sound like I was really hurt.

“Um, okay.” Stiles glanced from me to the ash in his hands. “He said you have to believe. You need to believe.” Stiles started talking to himself. “Come on, believe, Stiles. Just uh…”

“Picture it.”

“Picture it. Just imagine it working okay? Just. imagine.”

Stiles closed his eyes and started walking, spreading the remaining ash in his hand as he went. I squeezed my eyes shut, and put my hands over my face.

“YES!” Stiles shouted.

Suddenly I was being lifted off the ground, I quickly opened my eyes and dropped my arms around Stiles’ neck as he spun me around.

“I did it.” Stiles breathed, setting me down slowly.

I felt myself moving closer to Stiles. “You did it.”

“Yeah.” Stiles rested his forehead against mine, “I did.”

My eyes fluttered closed, I felt Stiles’ nose against mine, and then his lips on my lips, slowly, gently. I pressed back, pushing myself on my toes. It was a simple kiss, but Stiles and I were both breathing hard when we pulled apart.

“We should probably find the others.” Stiles whispered slowly, out of breath.

“Yeah.” I nodded, Stiles’ forehead still pressed to mine.

Stiles muttered something under his breath and kissed me again, before pulling away completely and grabbing my hand.

“Should I go find Allison or Scott?”

“No way am I letting you go in there alone.” Stiles shook his head. “The wolf can take care of himself. And Allison’s more than capable too.” Stiles stopped in front of a door. “They should have Jackson in here.”

“Uh, no, no, no!” Stiles jumped back a little when he opened the door, I peered around his arm and spotted Erica and Isaac looking like they were about to jump him. “Just us! It’s just us, don’t freak. He okay?” Stiles shuffled into the room, pushing me behind him when he saw Jackson.

“Let’s find out.” Isaac grinned, waving his claws. Jackson took a swipe at Isaac, catching his wrist, causing everyone to jump back. “God.”

“Okay, no one does anything like that again, okay?” Stiles held me behind him when I tried to shuffle around him to see.

“Oh, I thought the ketamine was supposed to put him out.” Isaac cocked his head to the side.

“Yeah, well, apparently this is all we’re going to get.” Stiles sassed. “So let’s just hope that whoever’s controlling him just decided to show up tonight.”

“I’m here. I’m right here with you.” Jackson spoke, making everyone jump back.

Stiles glanced at me to make sure I was still behind him and took a step forward, I reached out to grab the back of Stiles’ jacket and pull him back but he moved just out of my reach.

“Jackson is that you?”

“Us, We’re all here.”

“Yeah that’s not omniscient.” I muttered, scooting closer to Erica and Isaac.

Stiles glanced back at me for a second. “Are you the one killing people?”

“We are the ones killing murderers.”

“So all the people you’ve killed so far…?” Stiles inched closer.

“Deserved it.” Jackson finished.

“See, we got a little rule book that says you only go after murderers.”

“Stiles.” I hissed. He waved me off.

“Anything can break if enough pressure’s applied.

“Alright, so the people you’re killing are all murderers then?”

“All. Each. Every. One.”

I exchanged nervous glances with Isaac.

“Well. Who did they murder?” Stiles finally asked the money question.

“Me.”

“Wait. What? What do you mean?” Stiles looked over at Erica, Isaac, and I. We shrugged.

“They murdered me. They murdered me.”

Jackson started to move strangely in  the chair, his eyes shifting into golden lizard eyes. Stiles shuffled backwards holding out his hand.

“Okay, all right, more ketamine. The man needs more ketamine. Come on.”

“We don’t have any more.” Isaac held up an empty bottle.

“Why didn’t Deaton give us enough?” I took the empty bottle, trying to make sense of the label.

“You used the whole bottle?! Um… okay, out, everybody out.” Stiles started to usher everyone out, grabbing me by the waist. Jackson started to shift, half of his body turning grey and scale-y in front of our eyes.

“Go! Go! Go!” Isaac pushed Stiles and I out first, then Erica and Isaac followed. Jackson had ripped free of the chair.

“Okay, find something to move in front of the door.” Stiles looked around frantically. Isaac, Erica and I held ourselves in front of the door, but it didn’t matter. Jackson burst through the wall in full Kanima form and burst into the warehouse.

“What do we do now?” I looked at the two werewolves, they glanced at each other and took off after Jackson.

“Crap.” Stiles muttered Derek was standing a few inches behind us. “Hey, um, so we kind of lost Jackson inside, but it’s…” Stiles trailed off Erica and Isaac stood at the line of mountain ash frowning. “Oh my god, it’s working. Oh this is –I did something!”

 “What are you doing here?” was out of my mouth before I could stop it.

“Scott.”

“What?” Stiles face scrunched up.

“Break it.”

“More than two words sentences would be nice. Also a please.” I put my hand on my hip. Derek looked straight at Stiles.

“What? No way!”

“Scott’s dying.” Derek stressed.

“Okay. What?” I looked over to Stiles.

“How do you know that?”

“Oh my god, Stiles, I just know! Break it!”

Stiles groaned and bent to break the line of ash.  Derek hurried across the line.  Stiles frowned down at the now broken line.

“Hey. At least it worked.”

“Yeah.” Stiles said sadly.

Red and blue police lights started to fill the air.

“Let’s go wait for Scott in the jeep.” Stiles quickly grabbed my elbow and pulled me to the jeep. “I can’t be found at another crime scene.”

“They’ll see your jeep.”

“Then we’ll drive around till Scott calls.”

“If he calls.” I climbed into the passenger seat, Stiles started up the jeep and drove off before the police cruisers could reach the warehouse.

Stiles ended up calling Scott after half and hour and then heading home.

“So he said he was fine and that was it?”

“No Derek said to go home and he’d be with him.”

Stiles pulled up in front of my house.

“Stiles…” I started.

Stiles nodded, “I know. I’ll see you, Taylor.”

“Okay.” I nodded, hesitating for a second. Stiles made no move to try and walk me to the door. I nodded to myself and squeezed Stiles’ hand before slipping out of the jeep.

I collapsed on my bed and dug my phone out of my purse.

“Hey? I was just about to call you?”

“Allison.” I breathed out.


	24. Chapter 24

“What’s wrong?”

“Do you want to come over? Spend the night? I need a girl right now.”

“Uh.”

“I mean I need girl talk.” I bit my lip. “I love you and all, but, I really need to talk to someone, face to face. Someone that isn’t one of the boys.”

“Okay. Give me a minute. I’m in the car with my dad.” Allison must have put her hand over the phone because all I heard after that was muffled. “Okay, my dad will drop me off with some clothes. I’ll be there in a few.”

“Thanks a lot Ally.”

I changed into a pair of yoga pants and an oversized sweatshirt., and braided back my sweaty curls. Then I jogged down the stairs and stood by the door watching for Allison. She had hardly gotten out of her dad’s SUV when I opened the door and walked out to meet her.

“Hi Mr. Argent.”

Allison’s dad nodded at me, “nice to finally meet you Ellison.”

“It’s nice to meet you too sir.”

Allison walked around to me with a backpack, pillow, and duffle.

“Thanks again, dad.” She smiled sweetly.

“Allison tells me you were at the rave tonight?”

“Unfortunately parties aren’t really my thing.”

“So you didn’t have fun?”

I looked at Allison, reading her face, and back at her dad. “Not really.”

He nodded, “Parties aren’t really my thing either. You two have fun, and get some sleep.”

“Bye, dad.”

“Bye Mr. Argent, it was nice meeting you, tell Mrs. Argent I said hi?”

Allison’s dad nodded and backed out of the driveway. Allison and I made our way inside.

“You are so lucky my dad wanted to meet you and that my mom thinks you’re socially awkward.”

“I am socially awkward.” I locked the door behind us.

“I know.” Allison giggled. She stopped and studied my face. “Okay, what’s up?”

I didn’t answer right away, instead I made my way upstairs to the TV room, Allison following close behind.

“Stiles kissed me.”

Allison dropped all her stuff on the sofa, “What?”

“I… I know…I mean I … I don’t know.”

“What? No, how? When? WHY!?”

“I don’t know.” I groaned. “One minute he was celebrating that he finished the mountain ash circle the next, BAM! We’re kissing.”

“Did he say anything else about it?”

“No.” I sank down on the sofa. “nothing. In fact it wasn’t even mentioned once, we were just like we always are. He didn’t even say anything like ‘forget it’ or ‘can we just pretend I didn’t do that’ nothing!”

Allison sighed sitting next to me on the sofa, “Would it make you feel better if I told you how things went with Matt?”

“Probably.” I picked at a loose thread on the cushion.

“Well, first of all, I had to drive.”

“I’m surprised he didn’t claim emasculation.” Allison snorted. “Wait how did you end up with your dad then?”

“When I got home he wanted to go and pick up a late night dinner, when you called we were sitting in the driveway. Don’t worry, you didn’t stop some father-daughter bonding or anything.”

“Ah, okay. Good. Now continue with Matt.”

“Right,” Allison laughed. “So we ran into Mr. Harris there, with a 21 year old.”

“No way!”

“Yeah, I mean this is after I ran into Scott and he yelled at me to stay out of the way.” Allison rolled her eyes.

“Scott…” I groaned, shaking my head.

“After that we were, like, sitting off to the side near the DJ, and I think he picked up that I really didn’t want to be there and that something was wrong because he started talking to me and said that he was perfect and stuff and then he kissed me, and I freaked out and jerked back. I… I ran off to make a call, or pretend to make a call. I was just super freaked out by it. I don’t even know why.” Allison slouched down.

“Hmm. Maybe because you have a boyfriend.” I smirked.

“Shut up.” Allison threw a pillow at me. “I can see why you and Stiles get along so well.”

“You shut up!” I threw the pillow back at her. Allison laughed.

“Okay, so I was driving him home and he… apologized for the kiss thing and called it a ‘bad idea’, and I told him not to worry about it. THEN he asks about me and Scott, so I had to be all ‘it’s complicated’  and he left his camera bag in my car, and there were all these pictures of lacrosse and then of me, like really creepy long lense type photos.”

“That’s not creepy.”

“And he came back for the bag with this weird look in his eyes. So I had to pretend that I had only saw the lacrosse pics. He tried to get me to come in and see the pictures on his computer and I had to high tail it out of there.” Allison finished.

“Okay, so from now on we agree to stay away from Matt for the rest of spring break and for all of eternity.”

“Yeah.” Allison nodded.

We ended up doing face masks, painting nails, and eventually falling asleep back to back in the middle of my bed. When I woke up the next morning, my face was in Allison’s hair and her legs were across mine. Despite the fact that both of  us were awake before noon, neither of us moved a muscle.

Allison shifted her weight so we were laying side my side, watching some cartoon.

“Was that your Aunt?” Allison lifted her head a bit.

I frowned at the sound of the door opening and closing downstairs. “She’s away on trip.”

The door to my room slowly opened, causing Allison and I to jump and scream. Scott stood in the doorway.

“Jesus, Scott!”

“Sorry!” he put his hands up. Feet pounded up the stairs and Stiles skidded to a halt behind him

“What happened?!”

“How did you guys get in here?!” I yelled, untangling myself from Allison’s legs and the blankets.

Stiles rubbed the back of his neck, “Uh. I may have a copy of your key.”

“Why are you two here?”

“I…uh…we….”

“We just wanted to make sure you were okay?” Scott tried.

“You could have called or something.” I got up out of bed and turned to Allison, “Excuse me Ally, while I deal with the boys.”

Both boys looked around wide-eyed as the registered the sickly sweet tone of my voice. I grabbed both of them by the ear and pulled them down the stairs.

“OW” “OW!” “Ow, seriously E!?”

“What is wrong with you two?!” I let go of their ears.

“We… were worried.”

“About me or Allison, because I seriously don’t buy either answer.”

Stiles and Scott shared a look.

Scott took the lead. “We really did want to make sure you were okay. I… I didn’t even know Allison was here.”

“And you!” I eyed Scott hard, “What did you gain from yelling at her huh?” I whisper yelled. “None of us exactly know what the other party is doing, between you, Derek, and her family, everyone’s got a different approach here!  And it’s not like anyone is communicating their ideas very clearly to anyone else. It’s all vague and ‘are you picking up what I’m putting down’ type shit. By the way, I really don’t buy that your little werewolf ears couldn’t pick up two hearts beating, and you both know my Aunt’s not here.”

“We’re going to go.” Scott pulled on Stiles’ sleeve a little.

“Look, I’m not mad at either of you, just… you have to learn how to talk, and call before you just show up at a girl’s house, okay?”

Scott nodded, I sighed, “Okay, come here both of you, hug me and get out of here so Allison and I can go back to doing nothing.”

Scott and Stiles shared a glance and shuffled into my arms for a hug. Stiles kissed my check before pulling away.

“Bye Elli.” Scott waved, Stiles followed him out the door.

Allison and I vegged out for the remainder of the day till I drove Allison home around 3, since she insisted that she be able to finish some homework before she forgot about it. I predictably didn’t hear from Scott or Stiles for the rest of the night and into the next day. 

Around noon, Allison called me to hang out over at her house, and that’s how I found myself proof reading Allison’s English paper on her bed while she worked on her math assignment at her desk. Mrs. Argent had been in a few times to make small talk and bring snacks up. I had the feeling she was hovering a bit, so Allison left the door open and kept our conversation to light things like school work, how rough Harris was, and TV shows that we both liked.

“Hey Lydia.” I perked up, seeing the strawberry blonde standing in Allison’s doorway with Macy’s bags in hand. “Happy Birthday!”

“Thank you, Ellison. Allison.” Lydia greeted. “Clear your schedules, this could take a while.”

“How many outfits do you plan to wear tonight?” Allison grinned. I had almost forgotten about Lydia’s birthday party if Allison hadn’t reminded me to bring over a few options so we could dress and drive out together.

“It’s my birthday party. I’m thinking host dress, evening dress, then, mm… after-hours casual.”

“You mean you in a teddy entertaining some hot bod.” I joked. Lydia wagged her eyebrows at me.

Allison looked a little concerned, examining a dress on her bed, “I noticed that you didn’t send out any invites.”

“It’s the biggest party of the year, Allison, everyone knows.” Lydia said as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. It wasn’t. I didn’t know. But the look Allison sent my way when I went to open my mouth stopped me from vocalizing that.

“I was wondering if maybe this year things, you know, might…be different?”

“Why would anything be different?” Lydia cocked her head to the side, examining another dress.

I sent Allison a panicked look, trying to tell her to tread carefully.

“Just ‘cause things have been off lately? Things…and people… like…Jackson.”

“What do you care about Jackson?”

“Do you know if he’s coming tonight?” I injected, trying to take Lydia’s glare off Allison.

“Everyone’s coming. This one’s American Rag, mm, I love it. For me, not you. This one’s material girl, it’s for you.” Allison barely caught the dress Lydia tossed at her. “And you,” Lydia pointed a finger at me, “I can’t have you showing up in your usual, despite what Allison tells me about that adorable daisy dress you wore a few nights ago.” Lydia tossed me a dark purple dress with a clear bodice, middle, and skirt defined by a black belt across the middle. “This will look good with your eye color.”

Allison’s mom appeared in the doorway gently knocking on the wall to get her attention.

“Mrs. Argent!” Lydia practically cheered, “What do you think about this one?”

“Oh um it’s lovely. Allison, uh, can I grab you for a moment to talk? Just the two of us?” Allison’s mom looked a little fidgety, like Stiles did when he had something bothering him. Allison didn’t seem to notice.

“Uh, can we do it later?”

“Actually, to be honest.. sooner would be…better.”

“Ally.” I nodded for her to go.

“Party’s at 10!” Lydia sang, still shifting through dresses.

“Um… will you be around before then?”

“I think so.”

“You think so?”

“I don’t know.”

Lydia started shifting through some accessories that she’d brought. “oh I guess the black one would fit. All right, here you go. No it’s too much.” She held up different accessories to the dress in Allison’s hands.

“I think I like it.” Allison nodded.

“You like it?” Lydia frowned.

“Yeah, no. I do. Happy birthday!” Allison said, seeming a little frazzled

“Oh. Thank you. I actually appreciate that.” I laughed at Lydia’s response. “And you, wear that silver owl necklace that you always wear. I think it would look great with this dress. Oh and because I believe you need the height, you’re wearing a pair of my patent leather brown pumps. I can’t be looking down at you all night, and I know you don’t own any shoes that are higher than 2 inches, and the only pair that you have are those wedges.”

“Okay Lydia.” I laughed, taking the shoes from her.

“Before you leave, I’m curling your hair and demanding that you show up to my house early for touch ups. I have to make sure that both of you look good. You’re an extension of me.”

“Okay, Lydia.” Allison laughed.

“Elli?”

“Aye, aye, captain Lydia.”

“Good.”

Lydia curled my hair in record time, setting it with more hair spray than I could use in a year, and probably enough to cause a small dent in the ozone. When I left, Lydia had managed to convince me to wrap a shirt around my hair to keep the humidity and wind from mussing it.

At home I got dressed in the dress Lydia had picked and did my make up to my liking, knowing that Lydia would probably insist on redoing it or adding more to it later. I sat on the couch downstairs trying not to flatten my hair, playing on my phone.

‘ _Harris was arrested’_

‘ _are you shitting me Stiles, how did you find that out?_ ’

‘ _tire tracks at the scene matched his_ ’

‘ _that’s not enough to arrest someone._ ’

‘ _that’s what I said too :) same car was seen at the hospital and the bumper sticker was ID’d and we saw it outside the rave._ ’

‘ _that sounds like a coincidence tho, Allison said she saw Harris inside with a girl_.’

Stiles didn’t respond after that, and one glance at the clock sent me running upstairs to grab Lydia’s shoes and my purse to wait for Allison to pick me up.

“Hey!”

“Hey” I slid into the passenger seat of Allison’s car, shoes in hand.

“Lydia’s going to kill you if you’re not wearing those shoes.”

“I know.” I rolled my eyes, “I’m prolonging my imminent pain.”

“With those shoes or with the fact that Lydia’s party is probably going to fall apart and she’s going to be upset?”

“Both.” I sighed, glad that Allison finally mentioned it. “No one’s going to show up are they?”

Allison hesitated, parking her car on the road in front of Lydia’s, “We can only hope that the queen bee is still the queen at the end of tonight.”

“You know I hate parties.” I frowned, shoving my feet into the shoes and tentatively taking a step out of Allison’s car.

“For Lydia.”

I nodded, “For Lydia.”

 


	25. Chapter 25

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *doesn't edit, posts anyway*

Together we walked slowly up her driveway and into the house. Lydia greeted us and went off to pour punch into glasses; she gave me and Allison the once over; before pronouncing us presentable, she tugged on the bodice of the dress I was wearing so that it showed a bit more cleavage than I was comfortable.

Allison and I exchanged glances before going into the living room to play with the Wii while we waited for Lydia to yell at us to do something. I glanced over at the door when the doorbell rang again, only to see a large yellow and pink box, Stiles’ head popped out over the top of it as he shouted Happy Birthday at Lydia. I rolled my eyes, trying to ignore the little pang in my stomach. Allison caught my eye with a sympathetic grimace, I shook my head at her and nodded to the game for her to press start. We had picked out a singing game and Allison picked a Spice Girls song. I threw myself wholeheartedly into the song, ignoring the door when it rang one more time.

“TELL ME WHAT YOU WANT WHAT YOU REALLY, REALLY WANT!” Allison and I bellowed into the mics. I pulled a few ridiculous 90s dance moves like the running man and the cabbage patch. We both struck a pose as the song ended.

“Let’s go outside.” Allison laughed, breathing hard.

“No one’s here.” I frowned, walking over to the stereo system.

“I don’t see Jackson.”

“Me either.”

“Scott and Stiles are here.” Allison nodded in their direction, the two had just walked outside and were standing near the tower of punch cups Lydia had set out.

Before I could stop her, Allison made her way over, playing with her fingers. I shuffled quickly behind her.

“Jackson’s not here.”

“Yeah no one’s here.” Stiles looked around the backyard, his eyes landed on me just behind Allison. I didn’t miss that his eyes drifted down to my cleavage. I pulled my Lydia approved leather jacket closer around me.

Scott followed his gaze and nodded lightly at me, turning back to Allison, “Maybe it’s just early?”

“Or maybe nobody’s coming because Lydia’s turned into the town whackjob.”

I glanced over at Lydia, standing alone across the pool.

“Well we have to do something.” I leaned against Allison’s shoulder, “She’s expecting a big outcome.”

“And because we’ve completely ignoring her for the past two weeks.” Allison added.

“She’s completely ignored Stiles the past ten years.” Scott pointed out.

“I prefer to think of it more as me not having been on her radar yet. But it doesn’t matter.” Stiles rushed.

“We don’t owe her a party.” Scott insisted.

“What about a chance to get back to normal?”

“Normal?” I walked around to stand within Allison’s vision, “Since when have things here ever been normal?”

“She wouldn’t be the town whackjob if it wasn’t for us.” Allison reasoned.

Scott sighed, “I guess I could use my co-captain status to get the lacrosse team here.”

Stiles nodded, “Yeah I also know some people who can get this thing going, like, really going.”

“Who?” Allison’s forehead crinkled.

“I met them the other night, let’s just say they know how to party.”

“Oh Stiles, no.” I groaned.

Stiles and Scott both pulled out their phones and walked a little apart from us.

“This is going to be very interesting.”

Allison nodded.  “Oh yeah.”

Lydia disappeared at the sound of the doorbell.

“I’m impressed, those boys work fast.” I leaned into Allison’s side. She laughed and pulled me off to the side as the backyard filled with people. When Allison was distracted by Danny and a few Lax boys, Lydia handed Allison and I a glass of punch. I sniffed it and made a face, setting it down on the table.

“You’re not going to drink that?”

“Well,” I tilted my head to the side, “there’s a 90% chance it’s already spiked, and I don’t drink despite the fact that I have two stereotypes working against me there. The teenager one and the southern one.”

I sighed, all I wanted to do was sneak off to the patio that Lydia had been standing on with the little fireplace and sofa and stay there, but Scott and Stiles were over there, and well, I was with Allison on the front of avoidance. Maybe I could just hide in a bathroom for a while. The party was making me feel anxious.

Eventually I snuck off, thinking to myself ‘fuck it’ and sat on the sofa just in time to hear some of Stiles and Scott’s conversation.

“Are you going to apologize to Allison or what?”

“Why should I apologize?”

“Because you’re the guy and it’s like, what we do.” I bit my lip, he wasn’t wrong.

“But I didn’t do anything wrong.”

“Then you should definitely apologize.” Stiles sighed, “see any time a guy thinks he hasn’t don anything wrong, it means he’s definitely done something wrong.”

“I’m not apologizing, are you apologizing to Elli?”

“Is that the full moon talking buddy?”

“Probably. Why do you care anyway?”

“Because, Scott. Something’s gotta go right here. I mean we’re getting our asses royally kicked, if you haven’t noticed. People are dying, I got my dad fired, you’re gonna be held back in school, Lydia’s a nutjob, I kissed her and haven’t talked to her about it so now it’s weird, and on top of all that I  have to watch you lose Allison to a stalker like Matt…”

I got up and walked inside, around bodies, across the house to Allison, not wanting to hear the rest of that conversation. I spotted Jackson walking through the house and out the back door. Lydia would be pleased that he was hear, but Stiles and Scott wouldn’t. I ducked outside behind him, just in time to see Scott and Stiles’ shocked faces, I moved over to Allison and Danny in the corner.

“Look at you.” Danny grinned, grabbing my hand and making me twirl. “Look at those girls. Where have you been hiding those?”

I rolled my eyes and hoped that the dim backyard was hiding my blush. “Shut up, Danny.”

“Seriously, Allison, why doesn’t she have guys lining up at her door?”

“Danny you’re too kind.” I found myself looking anywhere but at Danny.

“She’s only got eyes for one.” Allison teased, bumping her hip against mine. I rolled my eyes.

Across the yard I spotted Lydia talking to Scott and Stiles, no doubt accosting them to take more punch, every time she came to me I took one, smiled, and set it down elsewhere.

“Lydia’s in dress no2.” I pointed out to Allison and Danny.

Allison leant close to my ear. “Matt’s here.”

“Everyone’s acting weird.”

“It’s a party.” Danny laughed. “Haven’t you been around drunk kids before?”

Allison frowned. “Hey Danny we’ll be back later.” She pulled me closer to the pool.

“They’re not acting drunk.” I shook my head. “I’m going get a bottle of water. You’ll be okay?”

Allison nodded, watching Scott across the pool.

“Kay.” I patted her arm and made my way inside. In the kitchen I spotted Allison and Matt moving around the house together. Instead of going after her like I should have, I closed myself in the laundry room, with my bottle of water, and slid down on the floor against the door.  The anxiety that I had been suppressing most of the night started to roll in, I took a few shaky sips of water and moved against the cool washer side, trying to hold back any suppressed anxiety from the entire week and focus only on tonight.

“LYDIA!”  “ELLI!?”  “LYDIA!”  “ELLI!?” “LYDIA!!!”

“Stiles, finding Lydia is a little more important right now.” I could hear Scott’s voice outside the laundry room. I wanted to move, but I felt like lead.

“No it isn’t, what if she’s hallucinating too? Huh? What then Scott?!”

I leaned my forehead against the washer again, closing my eyes. Breathe in, breathe out. In and out. In, out, in, out.

“Elli?! Ell! Scott! I think she’s having a panic attack!”

“I’m fine.” I could feel my hands shaking. I slowly opened my eyes and looked up at Stiles, Scott standing over his shoulder with Allison. I blinked back the water in my eyes. “I’m fine.”

“No, you’re not. Were you hallucinating?!” Stiles started to rant on about something. I looked to Allison for help.

“Stiles, she didn’t drink any of Lydia’s punch.” Allison got Stiles to stop rambling.

“What?”

“Every time Lydia would hand me a cup I’d set it down.”

Stiles nodded, “Good, good. So just, normal anxiety then? That’s good.”

“Lydia’s missing.” Allison supplied.

“We have to clear everyone out then.”

“Too late.” Scott muttered. Sirens were sounding in the distance. I shared a look with Allison knowing we’d have to handle it.

“Go.” Allison nodded to Scott and Stiles, “Elli and I will handle the cops.”

Scott and Stiles took off, after a bit of convincing on Stiles’ part. Allison and I dealt with the cops.

“Hello? Dad? What? Wait… what?” Allison started to cry, “Yeah I’ll be right there, Ellison will drive me.”

“Ally.”

“M–my… my mom…”

“Ally.” I cooed, pulling Allison in for a hug.

“My mom…she’s dead.”

The cops were the least important thing now.

__


	26. Chapter 26

“I’ll drive you. Yeah. I’ll drive your car and I’ll call Stiles to come pick me up. Or if Melissa’s there I’ll get her to drive me home. okay? I’m here for you Ally.”

“T-thanks, Elli. Thank you. I just, I think I need some time.” Allison slid into the passenger side of her car, handing me her keys when I slid in the drivers.

“Well, I’m here…whenever you need me. You can barge into my room at 2 am if you need to. Allison. You’re my best friend. I love you like a sister.” I tried to hold back my own tears as I drove. In the parking lot of the hospital I locked Allison’s car when we were both out of it and handed her the keys. She sniffled. I pulled Allison into a bear hug. “Come on. I’ll walk you in and see if Mrs. McCall is in there, call Stiles, something.” Allison nodded against my shoulder.

“I should… I should go up. Meet my dad.”  Allison pulled back slowly, wiping her face. "This has to be some sort of test."

I nodded. “I’ll be down here for a little while, if you need me.”

“Thanks, Elli.” I watched Allison get in the elevator.

My phone buzzed in my pocket.

“Stiles? I was just about to call you. I need a ride from the hospital do you know if Scott’s mom is still here?”

“Matt’s the kanima master.”

“Wha-what?”

“I… I’ll come pick you up.”

“Hold on. Rewind. MATT?!” a few patrons stopped and stared at me.

“Yeah. I’ll…I’ll explain when I pick you up. Well I don’t really know how to explain but… we have to get to my dad after.”

I sat down on one of the plastic waiting chairs, and wiped the corners of my eyes trying not to smear my make up more than it already was.

“Excuse me, ma’am are you okay?” I looked up to see a nurse.

“Sorry, yes ma’am…I’m just… I just dropped my friend off… her mom… I’m just waiting to see if she needs me… I, uh, I h-have a friend coming p-pick me up.”

The nurse nodded.

“Okay, sweetie, I’ll be right over there if you need anything.” The nurse gently rubbed my knee and walked back to her station.

“Elli!” I jerked up. Scott was running toward me, Stiles jogging behind out of breath.

I stood, tugging down the back of my dress.

Stiles collided with me, “Are you okay?” “Is Allison okay?”

“I’m fine. Allison’s… going to be okay. Her mom…” I shook my head.

“Okay, I hate to be pushy,” Stiles started. I snorted, “but we really need to go talk to my dad.”

“Okay, okay, let’s go.” I waved the boys out the door. Wiping my thumbs under my eyes again. Scott put his hand on my shoulder in a comfort gesture. I pulled out my phone and texted Allison letting her know I was leaving and to text me if she needed anything or wanted to talk.

Scott let me sit in the front and the drive over to Stiles’ house was largely silent. I was too exhausted to talk, and given how the night was going so far, I wasn’t going to sleep any time soon.

Stiles pointed Scott and I up to his room and went to go get his dad. I sat down on the edge of Stiles’ bed, picking up a Beacon Hills hoodie from the middle of his bed and shedding my leather jacket in favor of the fleece. Stiles barreled in with his dad, the two Stilinski men and Scott hovered over Stiles’ desk and the 2006 year book.

“So this kid’s the real killer?” Mr. Stilinski didn’t sound very convinced with whatever Stiles had been telling him.

“Yeah!”

“No.”

“YES!”

“No.” Mr. Stilinski shook his head.

“Dad. Come on. Everybody knows that the police look for ways to connect victims in a murder okay? So all he had to do is, like, look through their transcripts and figure out which class they all had in common.”

“Yeah, except for the fact that the rave promoter, Kara, wasn’t in Harris’ class.”

“All right, okay, you’re right, sorry. Then I guess they dropped the charges against him?”

There was a beat of silence from Mr. Stilinski. Scott and I exchanged glances.

“No, you know what? They’re not dropping the charges, but that doesn’t prove anything!”

“H –”

“Scott, Ellison, do you believe this?”

“Oh.” Stiles frowned, glancing at both of us.

Scott went first. “It’s really hard to explain how we know this, but you just gotta trust us. We know it’s Matt.”

Mr. Stilinski turned to me. “He’s been nearly everywhere the murders happened. He’s been acting weird, even for him, plus he’s been stalking Allison.”

“Yeah, he took Harris’ car, okay?” Stiles tried. “Look, he knew that if a cop found tire tracks at one of the murders, and that if enough victims were in Harris’ class, that they’d arrest him.”

I fidgeted, checking my phone.

“All right, fine!” Mr. Stilinski relented, “I’ll allow the remote possibility, but give me a motive. I mean why would this kid want most of the 2006 swim team and it’s coach dead?”

“Isn’t it obvious?!” Stiles yelled, making everyone jump. “Our swim team sucks! They haven’t won in like, six years! Okay, so we don’t have a motive yet, I mean come on, does Harris?”

“What do you want me to do?” Mr. Stilinski sighed.

“We need to look at the evidence.” Scott said.

“Yeah, that would in the station, where I no longer work.” Mr. Stilinski pursed his lips a bit.

“Trust me, they’ll let you in.” Stiles nodded.

“Trust you?” Mr. Stilinski quirked an eyebrow.

“T–trust -trust Scott and Ellison?”

“Them, I trust.” He nodded at both Scott and I.

And that’s how we found ourselves at the police station at 2 in the morning, and still in a party dress. Which the deputy at the desk so kindly pointed out.

“It’s 2 in the morning.”

Mr. Stilinski sighed, “believe me, I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t extremely important.”

I pulled out my phone again to check and see if Allison texted back. I shoved the phone in the front pocket of the hoodie, disappointed.

“We check the hospital stuff first, okay?” Stiles whispered to Scott and I while his dad took care of the deputy.

“Why?”

“Because all the murders were committed by Jackson, except one, you remember.”

I shook my head.

“The pregnant girl, Jessica.” Scott nodded.

“Yeah, since Matt had to kill her himself somebody from the hospital couldn’t seen him.”

“Boys,” Mr. Stilinski gestured for us to follow him, “and girl.”

“It’s fine, Mr. Stilinski, you can lump me with them. I don’t mind."

.” I patted Mr. Stilinski’s arm as I passed him. He laughed a little.

I sat down on the other side of Mr. Stilinski’s old desk, leaning over to see the computer screen as they scrolled through footage from the hospital.

“I don’t know, guys. I mean, look at this, there was a six car pileup that night. The hospital’s jammed.” Mr. Stilinski frowned, scrolling through the footage.

“All right, just keep going. Look, he had to have passed one of the cameras on that floor to get to Jessica, okay? He’s got to be on the footage somewhere.”

“Unless he’s some sort of ninja.” I mused. Stiles glared half-heartedly at me. I shrugged and turned my attention back to the screen.

“Wait, what’s that?” I pointed.

“Oh hold on, Did you see that? Scroll back!” Scott pointed around the same part of the screen that I did.

“That’s him, that’s Matt!”

“All I see is the back of someone’s head.” Mr. Stilinski blanched.

“Matt’s head, yeah. I sit behind him in history, he’s got a very distinct cranium, it’s weird.”

I made a face.

“Are you crazy?” Mr. Stilinski’s face all but mirrored my own.

“Stiles that’s crazy.”

“All right, fine. Then look at his jacket, huh? How many people do you know who wear black leather jackets?”

“Millions literally."

“I was wearing one all night, Stiles.” I raised an eyebrow at him, “I mean I know you’re not the most observant and easily distracted but…”

“Okay,” Scott tried to diffuse the tension, “Can we scroll forward? There’s got to be a shot of him coming at one of the cameras?”

“Unless he knew where the cameras were and how to avoid facing them.” I frowned.

“Stop! Right there! Stop, stop! See there he is again!” Stiles pointed excitedly at the screen, bouncing a little.

“You mean there’s the back of his head again.” Mr. Stilinski groaned. I snorted.

“Okay but look, he’s talking to someone.”

“Isn’t that…” I pointed.

“He’s talking to my mom.” Scott frowned at the screen, he pulled out his phone.

“Scott, do you realize how many people your mom sees in a day?” I frowned, “there’s a very slim chance she’ll know what you’re even talking about.”

“I have to try.” Scott shrugged, holding the phone to his ear. “Mom, hey.” Scott started to explain to his mom what he needed.

Stiles looked hard at me, “what?”

“You’re supposed to be optimistic!”

“I’m being realistic.” I checked my phone again, “as much as I want Matt to be caught red handed, I don’t know if this is going to work.”

“This one’s sixteen? Dark hair? Looks like a normal teenager?” I rolled my eyes at Scott’s descriptors.

“And he’s evil!” Stiles interjected.

“Okay mom, I’m going to take a picture and send it to you.” Scott motioned for Stiles to hand him the year book, opened to Matt’s picture and quickly sent a text to his mom. “Did you get it… do you recognize him? Do you remember him?” apparently Stiles and Mr. Stilinski could hear what Scott’s mom was saying, but from across the desk I couldn’t. “It’s nothing, mom. I’ll explain later, I gotta go.”

“We’ve got shoe prints alongside the tire tracks at the trailer site.” Mr. Stilinski started shuffling through papers.

“And if they match, that puts Matt at the scene of three murders.” Stiles beamed, “The trailer, the hospital, and the rave.”

“Actually four,” Mr. Stilinski looked up from the computer, “a credit card receipt for an oil chance was signed by Matt at the garage where the mechanic was killed.”

I shivered at the memory.

Stiles sent me a concerned look, “When?”

“A couple of hours before you got there.”

“Alright dad, if one’s an incident, two’s a coincidence, three’s a patter, then what’s four?”

“Enough for a warrant.” I added.


	27. Chapter 27

“Scott call you mom back, see how quick she can get here. if I can get an official ID, I can get a search warrant, Stiles go to the front desk, tell them to let Scott’s mom in when she gets here.” Mr. Stilinski put the boys into action.

“On it.” Stiles flew out the room.

Scott got on the phone and got his mom to come over. “She’s on her way here.”

I froze. In the doorway stood Matt, gun in hand to Stiles’ back. “Scott?”

“Sheriff?” Scott tapped Mr. Stilinski.

Mr. Stilinski slowly looked up and spotted Matt, he got up slowly, hands outstretched. Stiles made his way over to me and Scott.

“Matt? It’s Matt right? Matt, whatever’s going on, I guarantee you there’s a solution that doesn’t involve a gun.”

Scott gently grabbed my upper arm and pulled me behind him, knowing Scott he could probably hear how hard my heart was pounding. Stiles took my hand in his.

“You know,” Matt laughed, a bit satanically, “it’s funny you say that, because I don’t think you’re away of just how right you are.”

“I know you don’t want to hurt people.” Mr. Stilinski spoke calmly.

“Actually, I want to hurt a lot of people. You three… excuse me, four… weren’t on my list, but I could be persuaded and one way is to try dialing somebody on your cell phone, like McCall is doing. That.. that could definitely get someone hurt. EVERYONE! NOW!”

I jumped a little, Scott and Stiles exchanged a look and pulled out their phones, I slowly followed their lead and handed mine to Scott to put on the desk.

Matt forced us down the hall to the holding cell room, where be forced Stiles to cuff his dad to the wall, keeping Scott and I on the other side of the room, but still within eyeshot.

“Tighter.” Matt ordered.

Stiles hesitated. “Do what he says, Stiles.”

Matt moved us back down the hall, Stiles kept going to reach out for my hand but one glance at Matt and he’d move away.

Scott stopped short looking down a hallway, Stiles kept me back.

“What are you going to kill everyone in here?” Scott looked at Matt.

“No, that’s what Jackson’s for. I just think about killing them, and he does it.” Matt looked fondly down the hall, then pushed Scott and Stiles forward, that’s when I caught sight of all the bloody bodies. Stiles’ warm hand grabbed mine and pulled me along with him.

“It’s okay.” He whispered lowly so Matt wouldn’t hear.

Matt pointed his gun at me, looking at Stiles and then Scott, “You are going to destroy all the evidence.”

Stiles went to move to the desk, still holding my hand, but Matt grabbed my upper arm. He pulled me back from Stiles and pressed the gun to my neck. Stiles nodded slowly backing up.

“Just…don’t hurt her okay.” There was something in Stiles voice that sounded so desperate and broken.

Matt dug the barrel into my neck. I tried to stay still. Stiles’ eyes caught mine, he nodded, “Okay.” And he backed up and Scott started shredding the evidence on the board behind Mr. Stilinski’s desk. Matt motioned for Stiles to start deleting things on the computer.

“Deleted and we’re done. All right? So, Matt since all the people you brutally murdered deserved it because they killed you first –whatever that means –I think we’re good here right? So, you let go of Ellison, I’ll get my dad, and we’ll go, you know? You continue the whole vengeance thing. Enjoy the Kanima.” Stiles tried.

Headlights shone through the window and gravel crunched outside. Scott’s mom. I squeezed my lips together.

“Sounds like your mom is here, McCall.” Matt smirked.

“Matt, don’t do this. When she comes to the door… I’ll just tell her to leave… I’ll tell her we didn’t find anything… please, Matt.” Scott begged.

“If you don’t move now.” The barrel pressed tighter against my neck. “I’m going to kill Ellison, then Stiles and then your mom.”

Scott sighed. Matt held the gun to my neck and forced, Scott and Stiles down the hall. He lowerd the gun only to point it at Scott and the door.

“Open it.”

“Please.” Scott tried.

“Open…the…door.”

Scott slowly opened the door. Thankfully instead of his mom, Derek stood there, very still.

“Oh thank god.”

Scott’s relief didn’t last long, as soon as that was out of his mouth, Derek crashed face first onto the ground, Jackson in half Kanima form standing behind where Derek once stood. I gasped.

Stiles gripped my hand, pulling me into him for some small form of comfort, putting me between him and Scott.

“This is the one controlling him? This kid?” Derek scoffed, immobile on the floor.

“Well Derek,” Matt sneered, crouching down, “not everyone’s lucky enough to be a big, bad werewolf. Oh yeah, that’s right, I’ve learned a few things lately. Werewolves, hunters, kanimas, it’s a fricken’ Halloween party every full moon, except for you Stiles, Ellison. What do you turn into?”

“Abominable Snowman. But, uh it’s more like a wintertime thing, you know, seasonal.”

“A really good friend and a puddle of anxiety, it’s kind of a two-fer.” My usual sarcasm was hidden behind a stutter and my wide eyes.

Matt rolled his eyes, Jackson’s hand swiped out getting the back of Stiles’ neck. Scott pulled me into him as Stiles’ hand was yanked from mine.

“You bitch.” Stiles groaned as he landed on top of Derek.

Scott went to pull him up but Jackson stopped him.

“Get him off of me.” Derek said through gritted teeth, I couldn’t tell if it was because he was agitated or because he was paralyzed.

Matt crouched down again, “Oh I don’t know, Derek. I think you two make a pretty good pair. It must kind of suck though, to have all that power taken away from you with just a little cut to the back of the neck. I bet you’re not used to feeling this helpless.”

“Still got some teeth, why don’t you get down here a little closer, huh? We’ll see how helpless I am.”

“Yeah, bitch.” Stiles chimed, a little muffled by Derek.

“Is that her?” Matt turned to Scott with the crunching of gravel outside, “Do what I tell you to and I won’t hurt her, I won’t even let Jackson near her.”

“Scott, don’t trust him!” Stiles yelped from the floor.

Matt flipped Stiles over so he was facing up at everyone and held the gun to my neck again and pressed his foot down on Stiles’ neck. “This work better for ya?”

My eyes started to water, I blinked back the tears.

“Okay, just stop! Stop!” Scott pulled Matt’s attention back to him.

“Then do what I tell you to.” Matt growled.

“Okay, all right! Just stop!” Scott held up his hands.

“You,” Matt pointed to Jackson, “take ‘em in there. You,” Matt pointed to Scott, “With me.”

Jackson pulled Stiles and Derek along and nodded at me to follow, wrapping a clawless hand around my wrist over Stiles’ hoodie.

“Elli, are you okay?” I looked back at Stiles, as Jackson pulled us into the office and closed the door. I nodded.

“No you’re not.” Derek sighed. “I can hear your heart.”

“That just means that I’m scared. Not that I’m not okay.” I snapped. Jackson let go of my wrist.

A loud bang sounded form the front.

“SCOTT!” I yelled.

“SCOTT! STILES!” Mr. Stilinski yelled from down the hall. “ELLI! What happened?!”

Jackson inched closer to me with a handful of claws. I backed up against the wall, almost tripping over Derek and Stiles. I sank down next to them, keeping my eyes on Jackson.

“MATT! Matt! Listen to me!” Mr. Stilinski yelled from down the hall.

“SHUT UP!” Matt bellowed.

I accidentally let out a little whimper.

“Ell.” Stiles spoke softly, I looked down at him. He looked like he was in pain.

I chewed on my lip. “I’m okay.” I assured him, my voice shaking.

Matt pushed Scott back into the room

“The evidence is gone. Why don’t you just go?” Scott sighed. My eyes went to the large red spot on the front of his shirt.

"You… you think the evidence mattered that much? Huh? No, no, I want the book.”

“What… what book?” Scott glanced at Matt in confusion. I frowned.

“The bestiary. Not just a few pages. I want the entire thing.”

“I don’t have it. It’s Gerard’s. what do you want it for anyway?

“I need answers.”

“Answers to what?”

“To this.” Matt lifted up his shirt. His entire side was looking like Jackson’s half kanima form, grey and scaly, but twice as nasty.

“Kanima.” I whispered.  Derek’s eyes flicked to me with slight recognition.

Matt pushed Scott out of the room. Jackson stood guard in the doorway.

“Hey.” Stiles hissed, “You know what’s happening to Matt?”

“I know the book’s not going to help him.” Derek whispered back, “You can’t just break the rules, not like this.”

“What do you mean?” I looked at Derek.

“Universe balances things out, always does.” I rolled my eyes are Derek’s cryptic answer, but I understood what he was saying.

“Is it because he’s using Jackson to kill people who don’t’ deserve it?”

“And killing people himself.” Derek sighed.

“So if Matt breaks the rules of the kanima…”

“He becomes the kanima.” I finished.

“Balance.” Derek confirmed.

“Will he believe us if we tell him that?”

“Not likely.” Derek’s jaw tensed.

“Okay, he’s going to kill all for us when he gets that book isn’t he?”

“Yep.”

My eyes went to Jackson standing in the doorway. Maybe I could crawl around him.

“All right, so what do we do? Do we just ….” I stepped over Stiles and Derek and sat on the ground on my knees. “Do we just sit here and wait to die?”

“Unless I can figure out a way to push the toxin out of my body faster, like triggering the healing process.”

“Wah-oh what are you doing? Aw that’s gross.” I glanced down at Derek’s thigh, he pushed his claws into his leg. I cringed.

I crawled along the floor, ducking back and leaning against the wall, just out of Jackson’s sight. I looked back at the boys on the floor, both of them were watching me. I ducked my head out of the doorframe. Jackson didn’t even flinch.

“God! That’s Oedipus you dumbass!” I heard from down the hall. If it wasn’t Matt who was speaking I probably would have cracked a smile.

“So is that hypothetical situation we talked about getting nay less hypothetical?” Stiles sounded a bit frantic. I was thankful that he had enough sense not to mention me or point it out and catch Jackson’s attention.

“I think so, I can move my toes.” Derek’s feet twitched.

“Dude I can move MY toes.” Stiles groaned.

There was a loud bang and the lights went out, and Jackson took off, I took that as my chance and ducked out of the room, keeping low, trying to remember the way to the holding cells, till the emergency lights kicked on. I didn’t want to be anywhere within Matt or Jackson’s vision when they did.

“Mr. Stilinski. Mrs. McCall!” I stumbled into the room as the emergency lights kicked on.

“Is everything okay?” “Is Scott okay?”

“I… I’m not sure. I … Scott’s okay. I only saw him for a little while, I just got away, he’s got Stiles and Derek in your office Mr. Stilinski. Are you two okay?” I was breathing hard. My heart was pounding.

“Ellison.” Mr. Stilinski started gently, “Are you having a panic attack.”

“I don’t think so.” I shook my head. “I’m just really freaked out.” I turned to Melissa in the cell. “Mrs. McCall, are you okay, he didn’t hurt you did he?”

“No, sweetie I’m fine I’m okay. Scott.”

“I… I think he’s fine.” I nodded.

There was a lot of loud banging and clattering down the hall. Mr. Stilinski was trying to pull himself free.

“I’m sorry.” I yelped. “I don’t have the keys. “I .. I might have a bobby pin?”

“That’s okay, Elli. It’s fine.” Mr. Stilinski pulled hard on the wall.

“Come on, come on, come on, you can do it.” Melissa chanted.

There was a loud clang as Mr. Stilinski pulled the metal hook from the wall.

Melissa gasped and screamed as Matt ran up behind Mr. Stilinski and knocked him out with the butt of the gun in his hand.

I stood in the cell room backed up against Mrs. McCall’s cell with Mr. Stilinski unconscious behind me. Matt had his gun pointed at me.

“Matt, Matt please listen to me.” Mrs. McCall tried. I was backed into a corned. “My son has been shot, and I’ve heard other gunfire, and I don’t know what’s happening, but can you please let me see my son?”

“How clueless are you people?” Matt sneered, backing up a bit.

“Come on Matt, I’ve got 8 years of dance, 4 years of gymnastics and 1 year of Karate, I’ve taken self defense classes every summer since I could walk. Don’t do this.”

“I’d love to see you try.” Matt sneered.

“My dad was a cop. I can take you down with three points of contact, and if given the opportunity I could probably choke you out with my thighs.”

“I don’t buy that.” Matt smirked. Mrs McCall whimpered behind me.

Derek and the Kanima were going at it across the room. I had to keep Matt’s attention on me.

I tried to keep my voice calm and level. “Well, a girl’s thighs are nearly twice as strong as any average guy’s upper arm strength. Do you really want to test that?” I could hear my dad’s voice in my head ‘keep him talking.’ “I’m pretty sure I’m running on pure adrenaline right now, Matt, I can’t feel my legs. Haven’t you ever heard stories about the things people do when they’re running on adrenaline? Mothers lifting cars off babies? People taking out bank robbers?”

Matt rolled his eyes. “How about this? I’ll give you a five second head start. If you don’t have me knocked out by then I’ll shoot you?”

About halfway through Matt’s little interlude I started moving, just as he finished his sentiment, I was halfway through a stupid attempt at a kick to his temple. When my foot made contact he dropped.

“Oh my god.” I immediately backed away. “I can’t believe I just did that.” I slowly backed away and into the wall next to Mrs. McCall’s cell. “I’ve never actually done that before. Oh my god. I feel like I’m going to throw up” I sank down onto the floor, “Oh god, I hope he didn’t see my underwear. The one night I’m not wearing shorts under a dress.”

I felt a hand on my shoulder and jumped. I glanced over to see Mrs. McCall.

“Try to breathe.”

I nodded, “I feel like I’m going to throw up. I can’t feel my legs either.”

"It’s the adrenaline. It’s okay.” Mrs. McCall rubbed my shoulder as best as she could through the bars. I jerked forward, pulling Stiles’ hoodie sleeve over my hand and grabbed the gun, I pushed it under the cell bars so no one could get it.

“I might pass out.”

Matt pushed himself up, glaring at me, but he ran from the room.

Scott ran into the room, pulling the kanima from the bars in front of me and his mom. oh no Scott, not here.

"Scott. Oh god Scott? Are you okay? Scott? No!” Melissa caught sight of her son’s face in the flickering light, Melissa backed away from me and the bars. Scott looked from his mom’s scared face to my own and bolted.

“ELLIS-oh” Stiles stopped short, glancing around the room, from the mess that the room was to me huddled against the bars wide eyed and breathing hard. 

I slowly pushed myself up to my feet. “Stiles.”

Stiles and I met halfway, he pulled me into a tight hug, rubbing my hair and lower back. He held me at arms length.

“Are you okay?”

“Yeah, yeah.” I nodded, “A little shaken but, your dad.”

Stiles let go of me and knelt down next to his dad.

“Stiles?”

“Yeah.”

“Where’s the keys?” I looked at Mrs. McCall huddled at the back of her cell. Stiles followed my line of vision and dug in his pockets, unlocking his dad’s handcuffs and tossing them to me. I fumbled a bit, unlocking the cell. “Mrs. McCall.” I breathed.

She lurched forward and pulled me into a hug.

“Oh god.” I whispered. “Are you okay, Elli?”

“I’m fine. I’m fine. Are you okay? You should go home. Get some sleep.”

“We all should.” Mr. Stilinski sat up on the floor, groaning, Stiles helped his dad up.

“Dad I really think you should go to the hospital, make sure you don’t have a concussion.”

“I’m fine.”

“Mr. Stilinski.” “Dad”

“Okay. Melissa?”

“Yeah. Yeah. I’ll, uh, I’ll drive you. You shouldn’t drive with a possible concussion.” Mrs. McCall slowly let go of me and took Mr. Stilinski by the arm.

“I’ll um, I’ll bring Elli home then,” Stiles nodded.

“You… you two be careful.” Mrs. McCall still looked shaken up from earlier.

Stiles hurried into the drivers seat and turned to me as I close the door on my side, “What happened in there?”

“Uh, I kicked Matt in the face?” Stiles’ eyes bugged out, so I rushed out the rest, “and Scott’s mom kind of saw him wolfed out.”

“Oh God. What?!” Stiles hit his head on the steering wheel. “You… Scott… What?”

“Yeah.”

“You kicked him? And Scott… oh god, Scott.”

I nodded.

“That’s why Mrs. McCall was freaking out.

“Yeah.”

“Do… do you want to stay over?” Stiles stammered, “I … I mean… if you’re aunt isn’t home? she isn’t is she?”

“No. she… she isn’t… actually. I’d, yeah, please?”

Stiles didn’t say anything for the rest of the drive. It wasn’t until we were walking up to the front door.

“Why did you do that?”

“Do what?”

“Crawl out of the room.” Stiles pushed the key into the lock.

“I couldn’t take sitting in there any longer, I felt helpless. And your dad, and Mrs. McCall. You know?”

“Just.” Stiles sighed. “I was freaking out when the lights went off and you disappeared. I thought Jackson had dragged you off. And now I find out you _roundhoused_ a guy.”

I shrugged, “at least you know I can hold my own. Even when I’m incredibly freaked out.”

I finally kicked off my shoes. 

“My feet hurt.” I pouted. “Can I borrow some sweats?”

“Yeah, yeah. I’ll, I think there’s some in the laundry room, clean of course.”

I laid out on the sofa, feeling exhausted.

“Ell. Elli. Ellison.” Stiles hand nudged me awake.

“Yeah?”

“Here.” Stiles handed me the pants. “Do you… do you need help?”

“I think I can handle it.” I rubbed the back of my hand over my eyes. Stiles helped me up and I shuffled my way to the bathroom. I shuffled back out, slightly more awake now that my make up was washed off, with my dress in one hand. “I think my jacket’s still in your room.”

Stiles nodded, “I’ll go put your dress with it.”

“Thanks.” I handed Stiles my dress and curled up on the sofa, watching some TV program that Stiles had put on.

Stiles sat down on the other end of the sofa, but I could feel his eyes on me.

“What?”

“N–nothing. It’s nothing.” Stiles face was red.

“I’m too tired to push that.” I frowned.

I fell asleep on the Stilinski’s couch, my feet pressed against Stiles’ side, I felt safer there than I had all night.

Sunlight streamed across my face, making the inside of my eyelids look pink, instead of dark, waking me up.

“Stiles.” I heard Mr. Stilinski sigh.

“Dad, seriously. An appointment with Mrs. Morrell?”

“You and Ellison both.”

“What Scott too?”

“Probably, Mrs. Morrell just mentioned both of you to me. I guess she knows that Ellison’s aunt isn’t home much and that the two of you hang out a lot.”

“Yeah well even an eggplant would know that.” Stiles sighed.

“Take her home when she wakes up. I have to get to work. Remember. Monday morning.”

 


	28. Chapter 28

Monday morning I found myself seated outside of Mrs. Morrell’s office. I hadn’t seen much of Stiles, Scott, or Allison for the rest of spring break. The only time I had seen Allison was when she called me to go with her to her mother’s funeral. Lydia and I held her hands the entire time. I hadn’t talked to Scott at all and I got the feeling he was avoiding everyone. The one or two times I’d talked to Stiles, he’d said he hadn’t talked to Scott. And despite the fact that Stiles hung out at my house quite a bit for the rest of break, he hardly said a word. I found myself hanging out with Lydia more whenever Stiles wasn’t around, as a distraction. So far I’d helped her with her bathing suit selection, her new shoes, and a brand new outfit for the lacrosse finals.

My leg bounced, making my legs unstick from the chair and restick. I tugged nervously at the bottom of my shorts, the tights I was wearing underneath did nothing to stop my legs from sticking to the chairs. I had been up since 4 am and at the school since 6:30. My hair was curled and half braided back, I had done and redone my eyeliner 3 times, and changed my shirt about 5 times before settling on the grey t-shirt with leather panels I was wearing now and a grey cardigan with maroon buttons. I chewed on my thumbnail. It was a habit I had kicked a year back, but I guess it was back again.

Stiles had arrived at school a little while after me, but he went in first. He had lacrosse practice in a little while, so when Ms. Morrell had come out of her office, looking at us expectantly, I let Stiles go first.

I jumped when the door to Ms. Morrell’s office opened, Stiles shuffled out, his head down.

“Sti–”

Stiles brushed out the door.

“Miss Taylor.” Ms. Morrell’s cool voice called me into her room.

I sat in front of her and let her stare at me expectantly.

“How are you?”

“As well as can be expected.”

Ms. Morrell stared at me, probably waiting for me to start spilling, but I wasn’t biting. Instead I picked at my nails, staring back at Ms. Morrell.

“How are you handling everything that happened at the police station?”

“If this meeting is to asses my mental facilities and capacity to handle trauma, you’re wasting your time. I’m dealing with it.”

“How?”

“I write. I journal. That’s helped for the most part, other than that I distract myself.”

“And how is that working for you?” I think at this point Ms. Morrell realized that I wasn’t going to just start spilling things out.

“Well, I now know way more about clothes than I’ll ever need to thanks to Lydia, she’s particularly good at shopping as a coping mechanism. Other than that I’ve been jogging more, watching more TV shows.”

“What are your feelings toward what happened with Matt?”

“He had a gun to my head half the night, you’d think I’d be less upset about it than I am. Not that I’m upset, I just don’t like the idea of anyone dying before they’re supposed to. I think about what it feels like to drown, not that I’d know, but everyone tries to hold their breaths as long as possible at some point in their lives when they go swimming. Your head feels like it’s going to explode if you hold it any longer and you have to fight to the surface for air even though you suddenly feel exhausted. I’d assume drowning is like that, except for the involuntary apnea.  That’s when you take in the water, because you can’t hold your breath any more and your body’s forcing you to breathe, kind of like sleep apnea.” I shrugged. “it’s just hard to believe that someone like him would have drowned in a few inches of water, he could have stood up and walked away. And, I mean, then there’s the whole thing where you can die from secondary drowning, and I know it’s possible to drown in an inch of water, But still…”

“And how’s your anxiety doing? I know you’ve had panic attacks on at least 3 separate occasions since you’ve been here. Have you had any after that night?”

“One. I was at Stiles’. I had gone over to pick up my jacket that I’d left at his house that night. I saw it and panicked.”

“Does your jacket trigger it now?”

“No. it was just a tidal wave of emotions that I’d been holding back. The collapse of adrenaline that had been keeping me going.”

“How are your friends?”

I shrugged, “Scott’s been dealing with his own problems, Allison’s been distant… understandably with her mom passing. I try to be there for her when she needs me, it’s not very often though.”

“And Stiles…”

“Stiles… things feel a little off with him, but I’ve seen him way more than I have Scott or Allison.”

“Are you sleeping?”

“Yeah.” I nodded, “At first I woke up several times a night. Then I had a few anxiety dreams, you know the ones where your teeth fall out. But I’m sleeping fine now. It’s easier knowing that Matt’s not out there brandishing a gun and hiding around a corner to press it to my throat.”

“You sound well adjusted. Like you’re handling this all very well.”

I shrugged, “at some point you have to learn how to deal and move on, wallowing never helped anybody. Besides if I can help my friends by moving on and being strong, then I’m better off. One less thing for someone else to worry about. You know, you have to keep going.”

Ms. Morrell nodded and ended our session. I went home, not even bothering trying to stay and watch lacrosse practice.  I had lied a little to Ms. Morrell. I wasn’t sleeping as well as I’d let on, and I was compartmentalizing things, boxing it away and putting it at the back of my mind, deep down, under all the other boxes.

I spent the next couple of days alone, or laying on Allison’s bed with her watching Chick Flicks like _The Notebook_ or _Mean Girls_ and crying our eyes out.  When we did talk, Allison told me she was there that night, at the police station, and that was dragged out of her after I vented out about my session with Ms. Morrell and the night at the station. I think she was impressed that I kicked Matt out cold.

Around noon on the day of the championships my phone buzzed.

‘ _Are you coming to the game tonight?_ ’ Stiles. I frowned.

‘ _i guess._ ’

Stiles didn’t reply.

I dressed in maroon and grey, maroon skinny jeans and a grey Beacon Hills shirt, and drove down to the school. I needed to tell Stiles and Scott good luck, whether they’d listen to me or not.

“Ellison.” I jumped a little and spun around. Mrs. McCall walked toward me. “You okay?”

“Yes ma’am. I was going to go tell Stiles good luck, if he’ll listen that is.”

“Come on, you can walk with me, I was going to talk to Scott.”

I followed Melissa down the hall, stopping at the door to the locker room instead of following her in.  Coach Finnstock started reciting the speech from Independence Day, I rolled my eyes. Melissa tapped Stiles on the shoulder in confusion. He said something to her and turned back to Coach, then he doubled back, making eye contact with me. I frowned, spying Gerard in the Locker room, just behind Coach Finnstock. Stiles shuffled backward when he started talking. Everyone started cheering and rushing out of the locker room.

“Elli.” Stiles caught my arm, pulling me aside. “Look, I’m sorry okay. I’m sorry about that morning. Are you okay?”

“Yeah. Look I just wanted to wish you and Scott good luck. So break a leg yeah?” I started to pull back.

“Ell.”

“It’s fine. Really. I know you guys have other stuff to think about, just pass it along to Scott, okay?”

“After the game.”

“What?”

“After the game. We’re talking after the game. So stick around… please?”

I nodded, “I’m going to go get a seat.”

“Yeah, okay.”

I started to walk down the hall, but I stopped short and spun around, “Stiles?”

“Yeah?”

I quickly walked back up to him and kissed his cheek. “For luck.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Stiles’ head bobbed like it usually did. I nodded and spun around hurrying out to the bleachers.

“Elli.”

“Mr. Stilinski.” I had finally been able to get Mr. Stilinski to call me Elli instead of Ellison. He offered me a seat to his left. Mrs. McCall took the one to his right, they immediately engaged in conversation. I watched Scott and Stiles talking on the bench, neither looking too excited about the game at hand.

“Oh my God.” Out of shock I accidentally swatted Mr. Stilinski’s arm.

“Ow! Oh no, why is my son running out on the field.”

“Because he’s on the team?” Melissa looked confused at Mr. Stilinski and my reactions.

“He is.” Mr. Stilinski nodded.

I jumped up and cheered with Mr. Stilinski. “YEAH-hA!”

“He’s on the team! He’s… he’s on the field. My Son is on the field!”

We both sat down awkwardly when everyone looked at us. I saw Scott grin at me and shake his head. I mouthed “oh my god” at him. He nodded, laughing.

“Lydia!” the red head sat down next to Mrs. McCall. She smiled at me, looking a little nervous.

I watched Stiles moving around nervously on the field in front of Danny.

“Oh god.” I mumbled.

Stiles wasn’t doing too well, not that he got much action., the other team had scored two before Stiles somehow managed to get the ball. Mr. Stilinski and I watched in shock and cringed when Stiles was tackled to the ground.

“He’s probably just warming up.” Mrs. McCall tried. Lydia nodded, eyes glued to Stiles, who was now fumbling around on the field to pick up the ball.

I cringed again and leaned against Mr. Stilinski when Stiles was pinned by two of the opposing team.

“Oh, he’s just a little nervous.” Lydia tried to reassure Mr. Stilinski.

“Plenty of time to turn it around.” I continued. Nodding.

Scott was cringing so hard on the bench I could see how much pain he felt for Stiles from the bleachers. Stiles got beamed in the face with the ball, this time none of us hid our feelings, Mr. Stilinski sat with his hands over his face, while Lydia and I both cringed. The other team had four points in the second quarter. I had resorted to chewing on my thumb nail when I spotted Isaac walking onto the field.

“We might see a turn around yet.” I mumbled. Out the corner of my eye I saw Scott nod.

Isaac started taking out members of his own team. I cringed. Why would he do that? Just take out Jackson.  Coach started yelling at Isaac from the sidelines, but he was still taking people out worse than that one game with the Abomination. Everyone moved to their feet when Isaac was taken out by Jackson.

Melissa ran down to Scott as Coach Finnstock shoved his helmet at him.

“Oh god. The glory boys are both on the pitch.”

“Did… did you just say pitch?” Mr. Stilinski raised an eyebrow.

“I relate to lacrosse on a Harry Potter level.” I mutter sheepishly.

Melissa came back and took her seat between Mr. Stilinski and Lydia and the game started up again. Stiles and Scott were both tackled down within seconds of each other. I found myself chewing on the side of my thumb, watching them get up slowly as the clock ticked down in the fourth quarter. After a few intense plays, I realized something.

“Where’s Scott?”

“What?”

“I… I don’t see his number on the field.”

The ball rolled to Stiles feet.

“Oh my god.” I muttered, leaning forward. Stiles picked up the ball and started running down the field screaming.

“Oh Crap.” Mr. Stilinski groaned.

He stopped just short of the goal.

“Stilinski shoot it!” Coach Finnstock yelled.

“SHOOT IT!” I screamed.

Mr. Stilinski and I were on our feet as the ball made it’s way into the goal.

“YEAAAA!”

Then he did it again, Stiles somehow got the ball and made his way down to the goal for another point, tying the score 9-9. In the middle of the cheering madness, Stiles looked where his dad, Melissa, Lydia, and I sat and pointed at us. Stiles scored another goal bringing the score 10-9. Lydia and I were on our feet screaming and jumping up and down, I almost whacked Mr. Stilinski over once or twice.

“Oh my god.” I laughed, “I can’t believe he’s doing it.”

I was torn between watching the celebrations on the field and the clock run down to 0. my heart almost stopped when I saw Scott and followed his eyes to Jackson. The lights all shut off and someone nearby screamed. And then came the madhouse, people started panicking and running. I stayed in one spot, letting Melissa run to find Scott. Then the lights came on and I ran down the field after Lydia.

“Stiles?”

Lydia started crying and Melissa was doing her nurse thing.

Mr. Stilinski barged forward, “Stiles? Stiles? Where the hell is my son?!”

“Stiles?!” I called. The hyperactive boy in the number 24 jersey was no where to be found. I sat down on the middle of the field, checking out.  Everyone started to disburse, Jackson was taken to the hospital, everyone else was leaving.

“Elli.”

“Scott?”

“It’s me, Elli.” I looked up.

Mr. Stilinski stood with his hand outstretched, looking upset. “We’ll find him.”

“We –we were supposed to talk… af–after the game.”

“Come on. You can come over to the house and wait. I’ll put out an APB.” I nodded. “Are you okay to drive?”

“Yes sir. I’ll meet you there.”

He nodded and walked away a little bit with his phone pressed to his ear. I pulled out my own and found Stiles’ contact and pressed ‘call’ and got Stiles’ voicemail.

“Hey, Stiles, it’s me. Uh. I don’t know where you are but your dad and I are really worried. And your jeep is still here so that’s even more worrisome. I just… I hope you’re okay. Okay? Call me Stilinski.” I hung up.

“You okay?” Scott and Isaac stood in front of me. Scott crouched down.

“Well, Jackson just sacrificed himself showing that he’s not as much of a heartless bastard as we all thought, and Stiles has disappeared. Those two things kind of balance each other out.”

“Yeah but that doesn’t say how _you_ are.” Scott frowned a bit, “I know you and Stiles are…”

“I’m a little upset, yeah, okay. I just…it’s not really like him to just disappear? I’m not going to lie, I’m kind of freaked out.” I cut Scott off before he could say anything to either crush or lift up my hopes.

Mr. Stilinski walked back up to us.

“I’ve got to meet with the medical examiner and try to figure out what happened with Jackson, I’ve got an APB out on Stiles. His jeep is still in the parking lot, so that means… the hell I don’t know what that means. Um, look if he answers his phone, if he answers his emails, if either one of you see him…”

“We’ll call you.” Isaac confirmed.

“He’s probably just freaked out from all the attention or something. We’ll find him.” I couldn’t tell if Scott was trying to reassure Mr. Stilinski or me at this point, but he was definitely lying, I nodded anyway.

“Elli. You can go over to the house and wait there, there’s a key under the plant thing by the back door. Let yourself in.”

Scott pulled me up from the ground.

“Thanks Mr. Stilinski. I’ll let you know if he shows up.” Mr. Stilinski walked off, I turned to Scott and Isaac, “Let me know if you find him, and be careful.”

Scott nodded, I turned and walked to my car and drove to the Stilinski residence, following Mr. Stilinski’s instructions for the key and letting myself into the house. I found Stiles’ lacrosse hoodie and curled up with it on the sofa, staring at my phone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shirtsleeves is almost at it's end, there's about two chapters left. I'm not sure if I'm going to write Book Two or not. Not unless I have time to do some heavy editing and planning.


	29. Chapter 29

Monday morning I found myself seated outside of Mrs. Morrell’s office. I hadn’t seen much of Stiles, Scott, or Allison for the rest of spring break. The only time I had seen Allison was when she called me to go with her to her mother’s funeral. Lydia and I held her hands the entire time. I hadn’t talked to Scott at all and I got the feeling he was avoiding everyone. The one or two times I’d talked to Stiles, he’d said he hadn’t talked to Scott. And despite the fact that Stiles hung out at my house quite a bit for the rest of break, he hardly said a word. I found myself hanging out with Lydia more whenever Stiles wasn’t around, as a distraction. So far I’d helped her with her bathing suit selection, her new shoes, and a brand new outfit for the lacrosse finals.

My leg bounced, making my legs unstick from the chair and restick. I tugged nervously at the bottom of my shorts, the tights I was wearing underneath did nothing to stop my legs from sticking to the chairs. I had been up since 4 am and at the school since 6:30. My hair was curled and half braided back, I had done and redone my eyeliner 3 times, and changed my shirt about 5 times before settling on the grey t-shirt with leather panels I was wearing now and a grey cardigan with maroon buttons. I chewed on my thumbnail. It was a habit I had kicked a year back, but I guess it was back again.

Stiles had arrived at school a little while after me, but he went in first. He had lacrosse practice in a little while, so when Ms. Morrell had come out of her office, looking at us expectantly, I let Stiles go first.

I jumped when the door to Ms. Morrell’s office opened, Stiles shuffled out, his head down.

“Sti–”

Stiles brushed out the door.

“Miss Taylor.” Ms. Morrell’s cool voice called me into her room.

I sat in front of her and let her stare at me expectantly.

“How are you?”

“As well as can be expected.”

Ms. Morrell stared at me, probably waiting for me to start spilling, but I wasn’t biting. Instead I picked at my nails, staring back at Ms. Morrell.

“How are you handling everything that happened at the police station?”

“If this meeting is to asses my mental facilities and capacity to handle trauma, you’re wasting your time. I’m dealing with it.”

“How?”

“I write. I journal. That’s helped for the most part, other than that I distract myself.”

“And how is that working for you?” I think at this point Ms. Morrell realized that I wasn’t going to just start spilling things out.

“Well, I now know way more about clothes than I’ll ever need to thanks to Lydia, she’s particularly good at shopping as a coping mechanism. Other than that I’ve been jogging more, watching more TV shows.”

“What are your feelings toward what happened with Matt?”

“He had a gun to my head half the night, you’d think I’d be less upset about it than I am. Not that I’m upset, I just don’t like the idea of anyone dying before they’re supposed to. I think about what it feels like to drown, not that I’d know, but everyone tries to hold their breaths as long as possible at some point in their lives when they go swimming. Your head feels like it’s going to explode if you hold it any longer and you have to fight to the surface for air even though you suddenly feel exhausted. I’d assume drowning is like that, except for the involuntary apnea.  That’s when you take in the water, because you can’t hold your breath any more and your body’s forcing you to breathe, kind of like sleep apnea.” I shrugged. “it’s just hard to believe that someone like him would have drowned in a few inches of water, he could have stood up and walked away. And, I mean, then there’s the whole thing where you can die from secondary drowning, and I know it’s possible to drown in an inch of water, But still…”

“And how’s your anxiety doing? I know you’ve had panic attacks on at least 3 separate occasions since you’ve been here. Have you had any after that night?”

“One. I was at Stiles’. I had gone over to pick up my jacket that I’d left at his house that night. I saw it and panicked.”

“Does your jacket trigger it now?”

“No. it was just a tidal wave of emotions that I’d been holding back. The collapse of adrenaline that had been keeping me going.”

“How are your friends?”

I shrugged, “Scott’s been dealing with his own problems, Allison’s been distant… understandably with her mom passing. I try to be there for her when she needs me, it’s not very often though.”

“And Stiles…”

“Stiles… things feel a little off with him, but I’ve seen him way more than I have Scott or Allison.”

“Are you sleeping?”

“Yeah.” I nodded, “At first I woke up several times a night. Then I had a few anxiety dreams, you know the ones where your teeth fall out. But I’m sleeping fine now. It’s easier knowing that Matt’s not out there brandishing a gun and hiding around a corner to press it to my throat.”

“You sound well adjusted. Like you’re handling this all very well.”

I shrugged, “at some point you have to learn how to deal and move on, wallowing never helped anybody. Besides if I can help my friends by moving on and being strong, then I’m better off. One less thing for someone else to worry about. You know, you have to keep going.”

Ms. Morrell nodded and ended our session. I went home, not even bothering trying to stay and watch lacrosse practice.  I had lied a little to Ms. Morrell. I wasn’t sleeping as well as I’d let on, and I was compartmentalizing things, boxing it away and putting it at the back of my mind, deep down, under all the other boxes.

I spent the next couple of days alone, or laying on Allison’s bed with her watching Chick Flicks like _The Notebook_ or _Mean Girls_ and crying our eyes out.  When we did talk, Allison told me she was there that night, at the police station, and that was dragged out of her after I vented out about my session with Ms. Morrell and the night at the station. I think she was impressed that I kicked Matt out cold.

Around noon on the day of the championships my phone buzzed.

‘ _Are you coming to the game tonight?_ ’ Stiles. I frowned.

‘ _i guess._ ’

Stiles didn’t reply.

I dressed in maroon and grey, maroon skinny jeans and a grey Beacon Hills shirt, and drove down to the school. I needed to tell Stiles and Scott good luck, whether they’d listen to me or not.

“Ellison.” I jumped a little and spun around. Mrs. McCall walked toward me. “You okay?”

“Yes ma’am. I was going to go tell Stiles good luck, if he’ll listen that is.”

“Come on, you can walk with me, I was going to talk to Scott.”

I followed Melissa down the hall, stopping at the door to the locker room instead of following her in.  Coach Finnstock started reciting the speech from Independence Day, I rolled my eyes. Melissa tapped Stiles on the shoulder in confusion. He said something to her and turned back to Coach, then he doubled back, making eye contact with me. I frowned, spying Gerard in the Locker room, just behind Coach Finnstock. Stiles shuffled backward when he started talking. Everyone started cheering and rushing out of the locker room.

“Elli.” Stiles caught my arm, pulling me aside. “Look, I’m sorry okay. I’m sorry about that morning. Are you okay?”

“Yeah. Look I just wanted to wish you and Scott good luck. So break a leg yeah?” I started to pull back.

“Ell.”

“It’s fine. Really. I know you guys have other stuff to think about, just pass it along to Scott, okay?”

“After the game.”

“What?”

“After the game. We’re talking after the game. So stick around… please?”

I nodded, “I’m going to go get a seat.”

“Yeah, okay.”

I started to walk down the hall, but I stopped short and spun around, “Stiles?”

“Yeah?”

I quickly walked back up to him and kissed his cheek. “For luck.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Stiles’ head bobbed like it usually did. I nodded and spun around hurrying out to the bleachers.

“Elli.”

“Mr. Stilinski.” I had finally been able to get Mr. Stilinski to call me Elli instead of Ellison. He offered me a seat to his left. Mrs. McCall took the one to his right, they immediately engaged in conversation. I watched Scott and Stiles talking on the bench, neither looking too excited about the game at hand.

“Oh my God.” Out of shock I accidentally swatted Mr. Stilinski’s arm.

“Ow! Oh no, why is my son running out on the field.”

“Because he’s on the team?” Melissa looked confused at Mr. Stilinski and my reactions.

“He is.” Mr. Stilinski nodded.

I jumped up and cheered with Mr. Stilinski. “YEAH-hA!”

“He’s on the team! He’s… he’s on the field. My Son is on the field!”

We both sat down awkwardly when everyone looked at us. I saw Scott grin at me and shake his head. I mouthed “oh my god” at him. He nodded, laughing.

“Lydia!” the red head sat down next to Mrs. McCall. She smiled at me, looking a little nervous.

I watched Stiles moving around nervously on the field in front of Danny.

“Oh god.” I mumbled.

Stiles wasn’t doing too well, not that he got much action., the other team had scored two before Stiles somehow managed to get the ball. Mr. Stilinski and I watched in shock and cringed when Stiles was tackled to the ground.

“He’s probably just warming up.” Mrs. McCall tried. Lydia nodded, eyes glued to Stiles, who was now fumbling around on the field to pick up the ball.

I cringed again and leaned against Mr. Stilinski when Stiles was pinned by two of the opposing team.

“Oh, he’s just a little nervous.” Lydia tried to reassure Mr. Stilinski.

“Plenty of time to turn it around.” I continued. Nodding.

Scott was cringing so hard on the bench I could see how much pain he felt for Stiles from the bleachers. Stiles got beamed in the face with the ball, this time none of us hid our feelings, Mr. Stilinski sat with his hands over his face, while Lydia and I both cringed. The other team had four points in the second quarter. I had resorted to chewing on my thumb nail when I spotted Isaac walking onto the field.

“We might see a turn around yet.” I mumbled. Out the corner of my eye I saw Scott nod.

Isaac started taking out members of his own team. I cringed. Why would he do that? Just take out Jackson.  Coach started yelling at Isaac from the sidelines, but he was still taking people out worse than that one game with the Abomination. Everyone moved to their feet when Isaac was taken out by Jackson.

Melissa ran down to Scott as Coach Finnstock shoved his helmet at him.

“Oh god. The glory boys are both on the pitch.”

“Did… did you just say pitch?” Mr. Stilinski raised an eyebrow.

“I relate to lacrosse on a Harry Potter level.” I mutter sheepishly.

Melissa came back and took her seat between Mr. Stilinski and Lydia and the game started up again. Stiles and Scott were both tackled down within seconds of each other. I found myself chewing on the side of my thumb, watching them get up slowly as the clock ticked down in the fourth quarter. After a few intense plays, I realized something.

“Where’s Scott?”

“What?”

“I… I don’t see his number on the field.”

The ball rolled to Stiles feet.

“Oh my god.” I muttered, leaning forward. Stiles picked up the ball and started running down the field screaming.

“Oh Crap.” Mr. Stilinski groaned.

He stopped just short of the goal.

“Stilinski shoot it!” Coach Finnstock yelled.

“SHOOT IT!” I screamed.

Mr. Stilinski and I were on our feet as the ball made it’s way into the goal.

“YEAAAA!”

Then he did it again, Stiles somehow got the ball and made his way down to the goal for another point, tying the score 9-9. In the middle of the cheering madness, Stiles looked where his dad, Melissa, Lydia, and I sat and pointed at us. Stiles scored another goal bringing the score 10-9. Lydia and I were on our feet screaming and jumping up and down, I almost whacked Mr. Stilinski over once or twice.

“Oh my god.” I laughed, “I can’t believe he’s doing it.”

I was torn between watching the celebrations on the field and the clock run down to 0. my heart almost stopped when I saw Scott and followed his eyes to Jackson. The lights all shut off and someone nearby screamed. And then came the madhouse, people started panicking and running. I stayed in one spot, letting Melissa run to find Scott. Then the lights came on and I ran down the field after Lydia.

“Stiles?”

Lydia started crying and Melissa was doing her nurse thing.

Mr. Stilinski barged forward, “Stiles? Stiles? Where the hell is my son?!”

“Stiles?!” I called. The hyperactive boy in the number 24 jersey was no where to be found. I sat down on the middle of the field, checking out.  Everyone started to disburse, Jackson was taken to the hospital, everyone else was leaving.

“Elli.”

“Scott?”

“It’s me, Elli.” I looked up.

Mr. Stilinski stood with his hand outstretched, looking upset. “We’ll find him.”

“We –we were supposed to talk… af–after the game.”

“Come on. You can come over to the house and wait. I’ll put out an APB.” I nodded. “Are you okay to drive?”

“Yes sir. I’ll meet you there.”

He nodded and walked away a little bit with his phone pressed to his ear. I pulled out my own and found Stiles’ contact and pressed ‘call’ and got Stiles’ voicemail.

“Hey, Stiles, it’s me. Uh. I don’t know where you are but your dad and I are really worried. And your jeep is still here so that’s even more worrisome. I just… I hope you’re okay. Okay? Call me Stilinski.” I hung up.

“You okay?” Scott and Isaac stood in front of me. Scott crouched down.

“Well, Jackson just sacrificed himself showing that he’s not as much of a heartless bastard as we all thought, and Stiles has disappeared. Those two things kind of balance each other out.”

“Yeah but that doesn’t say how _you_ are.” Scott frowned a bit, “I know you and Stiles are…”

“I’m a little upset, yeah, okay. I just…it’s not really like him to just disappear? I’m not going to lie, I’m kind of freaked out.” I cut Scott off before he could say anything to either crush or lift up my hopes.

Mr. Stilinski walked back up to us.

“I’ve got to meet with the medical examiner and try to figure out what happened with Jackson, I’ve got an APB out on Stiles. His jeep is still in the parking lot, so that means… the hell I don’t know what that means. Um, look if he answers his phone, if he answers his emails, if either one of you see him…”

“We’ll call you.” Isaac confirmed.

“He’s probably just freaked out from all the attention or something. We’ll find him.” I couldn’t tell if Scott was trying to reassure Mr. Stilinski or me at this point, but he was definitely lying, I nodded anyway.

“Elli. You can go over to the house and wait there, there’s a key under the plant thing by the back door. Let yourself in.”

Scott pulled me up from the ground.

“Thanks Mr. Stilinski. I’ll let you know if he shows up.” Mr. Stilinski walked off, I turned to Scott and Isaac, “Let me know if you find him, and be careful.”

Scott nodded, I turned and walked to my car and drove to the Stilinski residence, following Mr. Stilinski’s instructions for the key and letting myself into the house. I found Stiles’ lacrosse hoodie and curled up with it on the sofa, staring at my phone.

Mr. Stilinski came home, “no luck, kiddo?”

“No, sir.”

“I’m going to go upstairs and see if I can find anything.”

I nodded, half asleep. When I heard the door open and close again, I thought it was just Mr. Stilinski pacing around, so I let myself fall asleep.

“DAD!” I jolted awake.

“Stiles?!” I stumbled on my own feet, falling to the floor with a thud. I quickly scrambled onto my feet and up the stairs.

I skidded to a stop in front of Stiles’ room, Mr. Stilinski nodded at me over Stiles’ shoulder. The two of them were in the middle of a rather firm hug. I sighed in relief.

“Oh thank god.” I breathed.

Mr. Stilinski backed away from Stiles, and patted my shoulder as he walked pass me.  Stiles slowly turned around

“Oh my god.” I gasped, and launched myself at Stiles. “What happened?”

“Some kids from the other team. They –”

I pursed my lips and spoke lowly, angrily, “That may be the story you just told you dad, but I am not having that bullshit.”

Stiles licked his lower lip and he backed away from me. Stiles eyes flicked to my hands, where I held his hoodie still, and he moved around me to close the door. Stiles motioned for me to sit on his bed, and he sat next to me, gently grabbing my hands.

“It was Gerard.”

“Wha-?”

“It –it’s no big deal. He let me go. It’s fine. But… he had Erica and Boyd too. I just…”

“Thank goodness you’re okay.” I pulled my hand out of his and gently brushed his bruised lip, my eyes welling up a bit. “You know what, I … I’m going get you some ice for that… and a damp rag. You… you change, Okay?”

“Okay.” Stiles nodded. “Okay.”

When I came back into his room, Stiles was laying face down on his bed in sweats.

“Hey.”

Stiles rolled over. I sat down next to him and gently put the rag over his cheek and the ice bag on his lip. Stiles took the bag from me.

“What’s all that?” I pointed to the corner where half a dozen macy’s bags and jewelry boxes littered the ground.

“Uh. That’s from Lydia’s birthday. I … uh… I’m really bad at picking gifts.”

“Oh.”

“I’m going to return it.”

I nodded, “Yeah well I can’t imagine you keeping diamond earrings. You wouldn’t look good with pierced ears.” I tired to joke so he wouldn’t see the hurt I was feeling. I’m not even sure why I was feeling so hurt. Stiles had always had feelings for Lydia.

“Come here.” Stiles sighed. “You need to get some sleep.”

“I’m fine.” I laid down next to him anyway, on the other side of his bed so that he could leave the rag resting on his cheek and not roll over.

“No you’re not.” Stiles kissed the top of my head, his lips felt cold even through my hair.

“I am now, besides you’re one to talk,” I muttered, closing my eyes. “You know, next time you have trouble picking out a gift for someone, you should just call me and I’ll help you. That way you don’t have to worry about return policies.” I yawned.

Stiles laughed a little, “Okay, I’ll do that.”

I drifted off again, a little easier than I had for the last week. When I woke up, Lydia Martin was leaving the room.

“Hey, Lydia. Wait”

“Was that Lydia?” I rolled over, facing Stiles at his desk after a few minutes of silence.

“Uh. Yeah.”  Stiles nodded, sitting down on his bed next to me.

I felt something twist in my stomach, but I tried to ignore it. I just nodded.

“Are you okay? Is your face stiff?”

“Uh. A little.”

“I’ll go get you something for it, okay?” I had to get out of there for a minute before I started asking questions about Lydia and getting answers that would upset me.

I pushed myself up. Rubbing my eyes I walked down the hall, passing Mr. Stilinski on the way.

“Good morning, Elli.”

“Morning, Mr. Stilinski.”

I went to the bathroom and dug out a bottle of aspirin, instead of counting out two I just grabbed the bottle and filled a cup with some water and headed back to Stiles’ room.

“She left, huh?”

“Yeah.”

“So… is there, uh, anything there?”

“No, no. She’s in love with someone else.”

“Ah, listen, I know that getting beaten up, and with what happened to Jackson, has you pretty shaken, but be happy about one thing, the game, you were amazing.”

“Thanks dad”

“I mean it.  About the game. Look, it was pretty much over, and then you got the ball, and you started running. You scored. And the tide turned, and you scored again and again. You weren’t just MVP of the game, you were a hero.

“..,but two things.”

“Two?”

“Elli. And the game.” Stiles sighed, “And I’m not a hero, dad.”

“You were last night.”

“I’m not a hero.”

“Hey. I got aspirin.”  I moved slowly into the room.

“Thanks.” Stiles looked up at me with a small smile.

“I have to get to work.” Mr. Stilinski pushed himself up. “You two behave.”

“Drat, I was planning on having a tussle with a few greasers and sing a couple of fighting songs.” I joked.

“Boy when you wake up you really wake up.” Mr. Stilinski laughed.

“Bye dad.” “Bye Mr. Stilinski.”

Stiles popped back a few of the pills and downed the water. “Thanks, E.”

“No prob.” I planted face down on Stiles’ bed.

I heard Stiles sigh. “Ell.”

“hmm?”

“Are you okay?”

“You know, after all the freaking out that happened last night, I think I deserve to not be alright.” I huffed, “but I’m okay…at least I think I am.”

I looked at my phone and groaned, I had half a dozen missed calls from Allison, Scott, and surprisingly from Lydia. And then I caught sight of the time.

“Oh my god. Did I really sleep all day?”

“Uh, yeah.” Stiles rubbed the back of his neck. “I figured that neither of us where sleeping that great, so I let you sleep. I mean. I didn’t wake up till 3 anyway so.” Stiles rambled nervously.

“Okay. Seriously? What’s bothering you?” I pushed myself up on my elbows. “You’re acting like someone just told you that they ran over your pet puppy. And then they kicked you in the balls, and then they stole your jeep and your girlfriend.” I snorted.

“I don’t have a girlfriend.” Stiles pointed out with a frown.

I thought for a second, choosing to be funny rather than take a jab at Stiles’ love for Lydia, “Scott’s kind of your girlfriend.”

Stiles rolled his eyes. “I’m not sure it works like that.”

“You’re right, you’d be the girlfriend in that relationship. Scott totally wears the furry pants.”

Stiles phone buzzed.

“Is that the boyfriend?” I cracked.

“Scott’s called me 30 times.”

“So he’s worried.”

“It’s his fault all this happened.”

“Not really, it’s Derek’s right? And then it’s also yours for being involved because you’re so freakishly smart and sarcastic. But I get the feeling that you’re not just talking about Mr. Furry Pants.”

“I had it all planned out.” Stiles groaned, his head in his hands.

“What planned out?”

Stiles looked up at me and his face went red, “N-n-nothing. It’s nothing, don’t worry about it.”

“I’m naturally inquisitive, Stilinski.” I reminded him in a teasing voice.

Stiles laughed sadly, “Yeah I know.”

“So are we bringing humans to the werewolf fight?” I pursed my lips. “Because I really don’t like sitting out on the sidelines and waiting to be told things.”

“You don’t have to do this.” Stiles sighed.

“No. I don’t. but I want to. Scott, Allison, Lydia… you. You’re my friends and besides,” I smirked, “I can kick a little ass myself if I have to.”

“But if you get hurt, if you or I get hurt… we can’t heal. Not like they can.”

“I know. That’s why we have to be careful.” I got up and grabbed Stiles’ hoodie, putting it on. “Let’s go, ponyboy. We have a knife fight to break up.”

Stiles laughed, shaking his head. He grabbed his keys. I grinned and took hold of his wrist, pulling him down the stairs and out the door, grabbing my shoes along the way.

“Okay, okay, we have to pick up…”

“Lydia.” I stopped short, the strawberry blonde was leaning up against Stiles’ jeep.

“Took you two long enough.” She smirked. Lydia scanned me up and down, “ew, please don’t tell me you’re still wearing what you had on at the game last night.”

“Yeah well it’s not like I went home to change. I was a bit preoccupied.” I pulled open the passenger side door, Stiles was already getting into the drivers seat. “I guess I’m in the back since Miss Lydia is wearing a dress.” I grumbled, climbing over the seats and accidentally hitting Stiles in the head with my foot.

“Ow!”

“Sorry!” I smirked.

Lydia took her time getting in.

“Okay, princess, any time now.” I tapped my fingers impatiently. “We have to save Jackson and stuff.”

“Okay, Okay.” Stiles put the jeep in drive, not waiting for Lydia to put on her seat belt.

“So where are we headed?” I leaned over between the two seats.

“I don’t know.” Stiles admitted, “But I think I have an idea.”

Stiles put the car into a faster gear and pressed the gas.


	30. Chapter 30

~

“Oh my god!” Lydia shrieked, Stiles was driving straight into a wall.

“Stiles are you sure…?”

“Did I get him?” Stiles had driven straight through the metal siding of the warehouse and right into Jackson.

“Whoa,” I can’t believe that actually worked.

Jackson jumped up on the hood of Stiles’ car, causing both Stiles and Lydia to jump back and scream.

“Seriously.” I rolled my eyes at the two. “I don’t do horror movies and I’m less scared than you two are.”

I tried to climb over the seat and get out, but Stiles grabbed my waist and pulled me into his lap, holding me there.

“What are you…” Stiles pulled me out of the jeep and carried me over to where Scott was standing. “Are you kidding me?!” I squeaked out.

“Jackson! Jackson!” Lydia climbed out of the jeep, calling to the kanima.

I tried to wiggle out of Stiles’ grip but he was holding me so that my feet just skimmed the ground.  For someone who can’t run, Stiles sure was strong. Someone remind me why he wasn’t first line, oh yeah he kind of sucks at lacrosse.

“Ell.” Stiles grunted. 

I stopped struggling and glanced up, catching sight of Lydia. She stood in front of Jackson, holding out a key. I felt my heart drop and I have no idea why. Something about Lydia’s face was so heart wrenchingly sad. Scott put his hand on Stiles’ shoulder, pulling him back. I hadn’t even realized that he’d taken a step forward, nor that my feet were touching the ground. I straightened out. Yeah that’s why my heart dropped, Lydia was officially breaking up with Jackson, or making a love declaration, I’m not sure. But either way it looked like she was cutting it off with Jackson and that left her free for Stiles. Jackson took the key from Lydia’s hand and backed away. Derek and Peter came out of no where and stabbed Jackson in the stomach with their claws making me jumped backward into Allison.

I turned away as Lydia ran to Jackson. Allison tapped my shoulder, pointing over where Lydia and Jackson were. I turned.

“Do you… do you still…?” Jackson sounded like a really bad twilight line.

“I do. I do still love you, I do, I do still love you, I do, I do,” Lydia chanted as Jackson slumped into her.

Stiles backed up a little. I felt a little bad for him, despite what it could mean for me. I could hear the squeak of Alison’s leather gloves and couldn’t help but smile a little when I spotted Allison’s fingers laced with Scott’s. Lydia gently laid Jackson’s body on the ground.

Stiles inched closer to me, wrapping his arm around my waist and pulling me close.

“Where’s Gerard?”  I looked around when Allison said that, Gerard was no where to be seen.

“He can’t be far.”  Mr. Argent stepped forward.

Lydia stood up and turned to us, still crying. I felt Stiles take a step forward, almost as if on impulse, and stop at the sound of grating concrete. Everyone’s eyes landed on Jackson. His nails were long and looked like claws. Lydia froze and turned around just as Jackson’s eyes opened to reveal a bright blue. Stiles stepped back again, pulling me into his chest as Jackson stood up completely naked and roared.

“That’s way more of Jackson than I’m comfortable with.” I murmured. “Y’re a werewolf Jackson.”

Lydia rushed to Jackson. Stiles let go of me and moved forward, Scott shot him a glance.

“Scratched my jeep.” Stiles sniffed, looking more than a little sad. I stayed where I was, taking it all in. Scott moved off with Allison and Chris. Derek and Isaac were talking with Jackson and Lydia or something. Everyone was moving off and leaving.

“Elli? You coming?” Stiles was leaning against the passenger side of his jeep, holding the door open. Even beat up and bruised, he’d never looked  more attractive.

“Yeah.” I nodded, slowly making my way over to him. “You okay?” I asked softly.

Stiles nodded, “yeah.”

I shuffled into Stiles’ arms, he wrapped them around my shoulders and held me tight.

“Let’s go to your house. I’m exhausted.”

Stiles nodded, “One thing first.”

“Wha-“

Stiles cut me off, pressing his lips to mine. My eyes fluttered shut and when Stiles pulled back, I couldn’t help the grin on my face. In the back of my mind I couldn’t help but worry a little that it was only because of Lydia that Stiles kissed me, but at the moment I couldn’t care less.

“Let’s go home and get some sleep.” Stiles whispered, kissing my forehead.

“Yeah.” I nodded.

Stiles helped me into the jeep and we left.

~

“Think everyone’s going to be okay?” I asked later when Stiles and I were laying in his bed side by side.

“Yeah. At least I hope so.” Stiles took my hand and threaded our fingers together. “Scott thinks Allison’s breaking up with him through. He’s preparing for that.”

“She told me she’s going to France for the summer.” I played with Stiles’ fingers a little. He grinned softly.

“Yeah?”

“Mhmm. Something about training and family history. I guess she figured that she can’t be the girlfriend Scott needs right now.” I turned to the side, resting my chin against his shoulder.

“I don’t think Scott’s going to let her go that easy. He believes they’re going to be together in the end.”

“I think Scott’s always going to love her, and she’s always going to love him. That’s how it is with first loves, they’re always with you. No matter who else comes along. No matter how you feel about someone else, they’re always in a little corner of your heart.”

Stiles softly kissed the side of my head and then he got a hesitant expression on his face, “Do…do you have someone like that? You know… uh, in your heart?”

“Totally.” Stiles face dropped a little. “Harry Potter is forever my homeboy.” Stiles visibly relaxed. I rolled my eyes. “I know for you it’s Lydia. No matter what, she’ll always be in there.” I gently poked Stiles’ chest with my free hand.

“It’s not like it was ever mutual though.” Stiles tilted his head back and to the side a little to look me in the eyes. “I’m not sure if it counts.”

“Well it sure wasn’t mutual with Harry Potter, yet it’s still there.” Stiles’ hand twitched, reminding me that we were still holding hands, “What about you?”

“What about me?”

“Think you’re having a shot at Lydia this summer?” my stomach twisted just trying to get the words out of my mouth, I’m not sure I even really wanted to know.

“Nah. I’ve got something better planned this summer.”

I laughed, “Something or someone?”

“How about something with someone?”

“Stiles?”

“Yeah?” Stiles forehead rested against mine.

“Do you still think hanging out with girls is the kiss of death? And that you’ll be doomed to be their gay bff?”

Stiles groaned, “Scott told you.”

“Yeah.”

“No.” Stiles sighed, “I don’t.”

“Good, then we should go shopping sometime.” A wide eyed look took over Stiles’ face. I grinned and started laughing, pulling back from Stiles. “Oh my goodness, your face.”

“Real funny. Really. I’m laughing.” Stiles said sarcastically. I settled to a giggle.  Stiles rolled his eyes at me but he was smiling anyway.

“Knock, knock.” Stiles door pushed open, Mr. Stilinski stood in the doorway. “Hey kids.”

“Hey, Mr. Stilinski.” I managed to giggle out.

Stiles rolled his eyes again, “Dad?”

“Just checking up on the two of you.”

“Dad.” Stiles whined.

“Stiles.” Mr. Stilinski said sternly.

I started laughing again.

“Dad. Seriously.” Stiles whined.

I ended up rolling off the bed and hitting the floor with a thud.

“Elli!” Stiles jumped up and around the bed, offering me a hand.

“You okay, Ell?”

“I’m fine.” I laughed, waving it off.

“Okay well I have to go down to the station. I got called in. So I’ll see you two in the morning?”

“Yeah, Elli’s staying over.” Stiles nodded in confirmation. Mr. Stilinski nodded, studying Stiles.

“Okay. No funny business, Stiles.” Mr. Stilinski bowed out of the room and I caught sight of how red Stiles’ face was.

I bit my lip, holding back my comment until I saw the gleam of the headlights in Stiles’ window.

“Your dad totally thought you were going to get some.” I howled out.

“Shut up.”

“Your dad is generous, all things considered.”

“What?”

I shrugged. “We’re not dating and I’m not the friends with benefits/one night type.”

“Oh.” Stiles nodded awkwardly rubbing the back of his head.

I flopped back down on his bed. “Cuddles?”

Stiles grinned again and nodded, laying down with me. His phone buzzed between us. I laughed.

“So excited you’re vibrating?”

“Shut up.” Stiles laughed, shuffling backward a little to pull out his phone.

“Who texted? Was it Lyyyyydia? Or your boyfriend, Scott?” I teased.

Stiles shoot his head, shooting  me a stern look. “Can we not talk about Lydia while I’m cuddling with you?” I rolled my eyes a bit but nodded, secretly elated that Stiles didn’t want to talk about her around me. “Scott, he wants to get together tomorrow for a little lacrosse practice.”

“Am I invited? Or is it just the bros?”

“Technically you’re a bro now.” Stiles pulled me into his chest a little, trying to use both hands to text Scott back. “You know that right?”

“I didn’t. but it’s nice to know that now. So does this mean I get in on bro-nights? Where the two of you talk girls and play video games?” I rested my chin on Stiles’ chest.

“Maybe.” Stiles snorted. “Depends on if we have to talk about something you won’t like.”

“Offended.” I scoffed.

Stiles phone buzzed again. “Scott says you can come. You can provide feminine insight.”

I fake gasped, “I’m a girl?!”

“Shut up.” Stiles shoved his phone onto his nightstand. “Go to sleep.”

“Rude, much. You’re lucky I enjoy being around you.” I mumbled, rested my head on Stiles’ chest.

He kissed the top of my head and spoke softly with a fondness that I couldn’t quite place. “I am.”

~

I sat in the grass a safe distance away from Stiles and Scott’s little lacrosse game, watching the two of them joke around and talk about Allison.

“So you think she’s really gonna come back to you?”

“Yeah I know she is.” Scott grinned. “What about you and Lydia?”

I cringed a bit and apparently so did Stiles, I could see him flinch from where I sat.

“Ah, well, the 10 year plan for making Lydia fall in love with me has been shelved.” 10 year plan?

“Why don’t you just ask her out?”

“Yeah, okay. Why don’t you just get into the goal and help me make team captain like you promised there, big guy.” Stiles yelled back sarcastically, glancing over at me. I waved sarcastically, reminding them that, yes I am here.

“Hey, you know what I just realized?” Scott walked to the goal. “I’m right back where I started.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, no lacrosse, no popularity, no girlfriend. Nothing.”

“Dude you still got me.” Stiles rolled his eyes, pretending to be offended.

“I had you before.” Scott rolled his head to the side.

“Yeah and you still got me, okay? It’s a life fulfilled.”

I snorted and called out, “What am I? and technically you still have lacrosse, you’re in off season buddy.”

Scott waved a middle finger at me. I gasped and held a hand over my heart. “Are you trying to make me faint with your vulgarities?! For shame, Scott –whatever your middle name is –McCall.”

I could hear Stiles snickering.

“Now remember, no wolf powers.” Stiles reprimanded Scott as he scooped up a ball.

“Got it.”

“No I mean it, no super fast reflexes, no super eyesight, no hearing –none of that crap okay?”

“Okay. Come on.”

“You promise?”

“Just shoot already, Stilinski.” I yelled.

“Will you just take the shot already? Listen to Elli.” Scott laughed.

Stiles shot the ball and watched as Scott caught it.

“I said no wolf powers!” Stiles whined. I laughed, falling back into the grass.

“So this summer, I have a few ideas.” I called out to them, sitting back up, crossing my legs.

Scott and Stiles both looked over at me.

“Oh yeah? What’s that?” Scott looked over at Stiles, who shrugged.

“This is the first I’m hearing about this.”

“We do fun shit. and not illegal fun shit. we’re going to the beach, we’re playing laser tag, we’re going to sky zone ,swimming, ice skating, bowling, because we all know Scott sucks at coordination for someone who’s on a sports team, we’re going to eat pizza till we can’t move and it’s going to be a blast!”

“I think we found a good one, Scott.” Stiles beamed.

“What brought this on?” Scott laughed.

I shrugged. “Lydia only ever wants to go shopping or get mani’s. I’m not up to her standards half the time and Allison is gone for the summer. You two are stuck with me.”

“If being stuck with you means laser tag, I’m all for it.” Stiles twirled his lacrosse stick in his hands.

“Scott?” I tore my gaze from Stiles too look at the other boy.

“100%” Scott grinned at the two of us. “This summer will be the best, and I’m going to spend it not talking to Allison, and you,” Scott pointed at Stiles, “are going to be getting over Lydia.”

Stiles whined, “Scott, we talked about this I already am.”

“You think you’re going to be able to do that?” I tilted my head at Scott.

“What?”

“Not talk to Allison?”

Scott’s face went a little red, “She told me not to call her or email her or anything.”

“Oh.”

“S-she didn’t say that to… you?”

“No.” I said meekly, looking around trying to avoid Scott’s eyes. “She said she’d email me whenever she could.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah.” I nodded, making eye contact with a hesitant Stiles. "Don't worry, Scott, we'll make this summer great."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, that's it! That's Shirtsleeves. I hope everyone enjoyed it! Let me know what you guys think. <3


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